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intellegent:
You really didn’t read my comment. I said quite clearly that the animals of those times owed their lives to people, which is CERTAINLY not the case today. “Do you think that Hashem CH”V does not have the strength to tell us not to do something that He’d prefer we don’t???” Sure he does, but don’t forget, we are ALLOWED to.
Why would H-m allow us to do something that He’d prefer we don’t. I know that there are cases of things that we can take on ourself so I will ask further why we would be encouraged to eat meat and fish on Shabbos and other examples such as korbonos etc. which you still did not explain. (Besides for MITZVOS such as Tefillin, mezuzos that require that we use parchment?)
I hear that you say that so long as we were kind to the animals we were allowed to eat meat but now that they are treated cruelly we may not. Assuming that that makes sense, are you trying to say that the above cited mitzvos are null today? If so that is called putting your intelligence and logic above Hashem. The greeks felt that their minds were on top and there was nothing higher than their logic. The Maskilim also felt that way.
OK I’m jumping in real quick. I dont have sources for my statements, but this is what my Rabbi told me regarding scientific events:
1) He said that there were 7 worlds before ours (or ours is the 7th, I forget) and taht this “earth” world was built directly on top of what was here. So dinosaurs could be from past worlds…
2) Carbon dating is NOT fool proof. The scientists have been looking at how carbon reacts now – but if for example, you look at a human being, they age/grow much more rapidly in their youth than as an adult. Also, the mabul would have had a HUGE effect on carbon dating old things because water ages stuff.
3) He also said that anything based on the science of the time, and further proven wrong, just means that the rabbis were dealing with the scientific information at the time and are fallible. Therefore, the sun DOES NOT rotate around the earth, but vice versa. He did say that it could be taken metaphorically also that “the earth is the center of the universe” and the sun for example is significant because of what it does for the earth. This doesnt mean that they are wrong about halacha, just science.
intellegent, you wrote:
“Do you really believe that Hashem would specifically allow us to eat animals but would prefer that we dont?! Do you think that Hashem CH”V does not have the strength to tell us not to do something that He’d prefer we don’t???”
Yes, I believe that Hashem would allow someone to do something even if it would be better for him not to do it, not because Hashem is in any way lacking C”V but because He is well aware that people are. One example is found in Sefer D’Vorim, the inyan of Eishes Y’fas To’ar, in which a man is permitted to marry a captive. The m’forshim explain that this is allowed even though it is not considered the right thing to do, because otherwise the person might marry the captive anyways, so the procedure outlined in the Torah describes how to go about it in the “best” way possible.
Now I don’t know if eating meat falls into this category of something we are allowed to do but really shouldn’t, but I did want to address your point.
anon for this,
I am aware that there are such things in the torah that we are allowed to do but rather not. But why are we encouraged to eat/use animals? There are Mitzvos in the Torah that we need to use animals for in order to fulfill. Do you agree?
I strongly recomend anyone intrested in either animal rights in yidishkeit or science and torah read the books by r’nosson slifkin on these subjects (science-“The challenge of creation” animal rights-“Of man and beast”) they are a bit hard to come by but you can get them on yashar books website or from Amazon.com
Slifkin’s books are a bit hard to come by for good reason. They’ve been banned by the Gedolim as kefira.
Give Me a Break
I believe the Korban Pesach is meat.
I love steak and my leather shoes and jackets. Sorry, I can’t part with them.
Would like to hear from someone who saw the PETA video filmed secretly at Agriproccessors. The film objected to frum Jews calling the slaughter humane, when the footage showed cows who were obviously still alive and trying (sometimes succeeding) to stand up and walk after being slit and having contents removed. Granted, footage at any slaughterhouse would be very disturbing to the uninitiated, however, this film seemed to clearly support their accusation. Would appreciate if only those who have seen the video would respond.
Give Me a Break: intelligent was a bit wrong on that comment. we are not encouraged, but demanded. karbonos, including the yom, mussaf, shabbos, pesach, etc.
one is michuyav to eat these animals. on top of that, there is an old adage “ein simcha ela vebasar veyayin”.
you say that just because hashem allows us to do something does not mean it is right. that may be correct, but hashem doesnt give us ways to steal, murder and cheat. yet he gives us the choice to do those things. he does give us a way to kill animals, called schittah. so your statement is false due to the process of logic.
intellegent: “anon for this, I am aware that there are such things in the torah that we are allowed to do but rather not. But why are we encouraged to eat/use animals? There are Mitzvos in the Torah that we need to use animals for in order to fulfill. Do you agree? “
um, how bout karbonos, ein simcha elah bibasar veyayin.
and how about the azazel, where we take a live animal and chuck it off a cliff. i think that would be considered “cruel” no?
and your idea that just because we are allowed it doesnt make it ok is false.
see, what you are saying does not exist anywhere else, except for you wanting it to add to this. we are not allowed to murder steal, rape, etc, because that is explicit in the torah. those would be negative commandments. then we have positive commandments. those would be tzitzis tefflin, shabbos, kibud av veeim, etc. and schitah. if god did not want us to eat animals, he never would have given us a way to kill them, and placed so much space in the torah on what animals we may and may not eat.
If you truly believe what you say, you belong in Cheirem.
BS”D
Not cheirem, Chelm.
Give Me a Break,
The following are some examples including using animals not necessarily for eating: Shabbos, Korbon Pesach, general Korbonos, mezuza, sefer tora, tefillin. These are a few examples. I’m sure others can think of more.
intellegent,
The halachos of karbonos do not apply at this time. Animal skins are needed for parchments of mezuzos & sifrei torah. There is an inyan of eating meat on yom tov, but that is because of simchah, so if someone can’t/ doesn’t want to eat meat then this wouldn’t apply to him. So as far as I can remember I’d say that the torah doesn’t require someone living in present times to actually eat meat, but please correct me if I’m wrong.
Personally, I do eat meat/ poultry/ fish.
anon for this,
Firstly, please explain how we can use skins of animals for Mitzvos without torturing and/or killing them? Are we to look through the forests and find animal corpses with salvagable skins on them? Or maybe “Give me a break” will tell as that there are some shitos that allow human skins to be used?
You say that there is an inyan of eating meat… because of simcha. I am not arguing if that is the reason or not as I am not even sure. What I do know is that the reasoning behind it would make a difference. If you are refraining from eating meat because of health reasons or because you don’t like it; that is one thing (even though there are people that eat a tiny drop just to be yotzei but that’s a different point..) But if you are refraining from eating it because you think you are above the Torah and have more logical morals, I highly doubt that is an acceptable reasoning.
BS”D
I have explained why the Korban Pesach was allowed – we took good care of the animals,
so they owed us their lives.
Source? Medrash Shtussim Rabim perhaps? I would mention what letter goes before tzaddik in the siman that you need to look up in said sefer but this is a G-rated site.
anon for this: you obviously have no clue as to how klaf is made. it needs to come from an animal that is shechted!
also, you say that hilchos karbonos dont apply today, and for that you are wrong. it is well known that had teh israelis not given control of the har habayis the year after we took control of the east side of jerusalem, we would have been able, and possibly mechuyav, to bring the korbon pesach. (i dont know the ligistics behind this, but i do know that this is true.)
you still have not answered how we are supposedly to be made to believe that all of the sudden in 1984 eating meat becomes a bad thing because, well, peta said so. that is nonsense. there is inherently nothing wrong with killing an animal and eating eat.
also, how do you get around eating meat on shabbos and yuntif, which according to many reshonim and achronim. and dont say mekubalim also dont eat meat, because the real ones do. yes in the past some have not, but when you are on their madrega you can learn all teh kaballah you want, and on a different plane of existence you can also refrain from eating meat.
until then, beef, its whats for dinner!
mariner,
WHY would we be allowed to bring Korbonos before we have the Bais Hamikdosh???
BS”D
No. Source: From the fact that Noach was only permitted to kill animals because he spent many sleepless nights over the welfare of the animals, so they were indebted to him.
Sorry but this is completely krum. Where in the world did you get this from? A quote out of context from a medrash? You know full well that we do not pasken or hold according to anything remotely related to this.
mariner,
I think you misread my post. I am well aware that klaf is made of shechted animals. But what I said is that there is nothing in the Torah that would require someone living _today_ to actually eat meat. As far as bringing karbonos today, I didn’t know this could be done; can you give a source for this?
intellegent,
You made a good point, in that animals must be killed to produce klaf, so the meat should be eaten rather than go to waste. But because the number of animals killed for klaf is much less than the number killed for meat (by orders of magnitude), even if a large group of frum Jews would stop eating meat none of the meat from animals shechted for klaf would likely go to waste.
As far as the inyan of eating meat on Shabbos & Yom Tov, I always thought that was because of simchas Yom Tov. If eating meat does not enhance a person’s simchah, whether because his doctor proscribed it or he doesn’t like the taste or he’s uncomfortable with the present-day shechting process, why should he eat meat? I have heard stories of gedolim forcing themselves to drink the arba kosos even if it made them ill; is eating meat on shabbos & yom tov in the same category?
I am not saying that there is anything wrong with eating meat because PETA said so. If PETA said it was raining outside I’d stick my hand out the window to check before taking my umbrella, beecause as I mentioned in my original post, their entire philosophy of animal rights is not one I agree with. I am just disagreeing with those who automatically assume someone who doesn’t eat meat is committing an avaira.
Went to a shiur on this.
Meat for Simcha is Shlamim (Korban) specific. If it is not a Korban, then there is no mitzva of eating meat.
Simcha these days is:
Men: Wine
Women: Clothes (Husband MUST provide)
Kids: Candy
There may be minor reasons to eat meat on Yom Tov, but none of them REQUIRE meat-eating.
If one doesn’t want to eat meat in this day and age, it is logical for a number of reasons:
1: Meat is expensive 🙂 Tuition is more important.
2: Easy to get fat on meat 🙁
3: Don’t trust Agri/Alle/other butchers
4: Wastes energy, and causes more fossil fuel to be bought, enriching Iran.
There are many others.
I have nothing good to say about PETA, so I will remain silent. 😐
anon for this,
That was not my point at all! I did not mean to say that we should eat meat from animals that we are killing anyway for klaf. I was just disproving “Give Me a Break’s” philosophy that we are permitted to kill animals but H-m would prefer we don’t. If we have so many mitzvos and minhagim around animals, it is obviously not cruel to kill them!
If it would be the wrong thing or even rather not to kill animals to eat/use would Hashem ask us to do certain things through cruelty? Are you saying that we must be cruel to animals for a Mitzva but nothing more? If it would be cruel wouldn’t Hashem, HaKol Yachul be able to come up with a different way of performing them?
About your point that it is not an avaira to refrain from eating meat, I agree with that completely! That is why I said that the reasoning behind it makes all the difference! Hashem knows our thoughts and He knows the reasons and thoughts behind our actions. If someone does not eat meat because he thinks it’s cruel, in essence he is saying that Hashem gave us mitzvos based on cruelty. If he is not eating because of a different reason, that is an other story.
It’s not the action, it’s the reason for the action.
Mariner, The Geula does not come until Mashiach. We cannot force the Geula upon ourselves and bring Korbonos as far as I know. (Weren’t the people who fled Egypt before the right time killed?) Please tell me if I am wrong and what is your source.
Food for thought:
If you are worried about the animals being tortured during shechita, think about what the goyim do to their meat! We make sure that the knife is sharp enough so it cuts easier ect while they might hack it a few times (sorry for being graphic).
Furthermore, one of the “most humane butchers” in America is the shechita house in St. Louis…
(Sorry about my title- I didnt realize the pun when I wrote it… Just noticed it now when rereading my post before I sent it in…)
000646: I heard one reason why Hashem created the world with fossils and other things like them.
There is a rule that whenever Hashem does something miraculous, He always includes a way to possibl explain it as normal. That’s why the wind blew all night before the Yam Suf split.
So, Hashem created the world, which was obviously a big miracle. He created fossils and other things looking really old so that people would have a way to explain it as a natural occurrence if they choose to.
As for eating meat, the Torah didn’t just say what was ok to eat – it says “osam tocheilu”, these you SHOULD eat. As others wrote, there are times when there’s a mitzvah to eat meat. How can you say Hashem didn’t intend for us to eat meat? The Torah says you should eat meat. Now, obviously, you have to treat the animals properly. However, if animals aren’t treated properly, you shouldn’t say, ‘Well, I won’t eat meat.” You can say you wouldn’t use a specific slaughterhouse because of it. But to say all eating meat is wrong because some slaughterhouses do things wrong is just stupid.
Feif un,
the world being old dosnt contradict the torah so why do you have to come onto a theory that has has absoloutly no proof backing it up, the fact that hashem could have made the world less then six thousand years ago is not a proof that he did, and untill there is such proof why should we assume that this is what happend when evreything physical points towards the fact that it didnt? just because gedolim of a previos generation beleived somthing SCIENTIFIC (as opposed to somthing in religion or anything else) to be true (that the world is young and that the sun circles the earth ect.) dosnt make it necesserily true as there knowledge in science was taken from what scientists at that time beleived.
Actually, the world being old does contradict the Torah. The Torah lays out dates for when things happened. It says Adam was created on the 6th day, right? If you follow the years of the ages when children were born, you can see that Avraham was born in (I believe) 1948. Yitzchak was born in 2048. We know the Jews went out of Egypt 400 years after Yitzchak was born, so that’s 2448, as was matan Torah. You can follow the years from there to calculate the year we are in now. Saying the world is millions of years old does contradict the Torah.
PETA is irrelvant. There is plenty in the Shas and Responsa literature about treatment of animals – which is all we need or should consider.
There are plenty of books that answer the problems you mentioned by rabbis kaplan and schroeder among others (i wont mention r slifkin again!) you can get them in just about any seforim store.
as the title of this discussion is peta, here is a letter they have sent today to ben and jerry’s, a left wing arabist company. (the fact taht they thought this might work, shows how bad ben and jerrys is, and how left wink kook the owners are!)
September 23, 2008
Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, Cofounders
Ben & Jerry’s Homemade Inc.
Dear Mr. Cohen and Mr. Greenfield,
On behalf of PETA and our more than 2 million members and supporters, I’d like to bring your attention to an innovative new idea from Switzerland that would bring a unique twist to Ben and Jerry’s.
Storchen restaurant is set to unveil a menu that includes soups, stews, and sauces made with at least 75 percent breast milk procured from human donors who are paid in exchange for their milk. If Ben and Jerry’s replaced the cow’s milk in its ice cream with breast milk, your customers-and cows-would reap the benefits.
Using cow’s milk for your ice cream is a hazard to your customer’s health. Dairy products have been linked to juvenile diabetes, allergies, constipation, obesity, and prostate and ovarian cancer. The late Dr. Benjamin Spock, America’s leading authority on child care, spoke out against feeding cow’s milk to children, saying it may play a role in anemia, allergies, and juvenile diabetes and in the long term, will set kids up for obesity and heart disease-America’s number one cause of death.
Animals will also benefit from the switch to breast milk. Like all mammals, cows only produce milk during and after pregnancy, so to be able to constantly milk them, cows are forcefully impregnated every nine months. After several years of living in filthy conditions and being forced to produce 10 times more milk than they would naturally, their exhausted bodies are turned into hamburgers or ground up for soup.
And of course, the veal industry could not survive without the dairy industry. Because male calves can’t produce milk, dairy farmers take them from their mothers immediately after birth and sell them to veal farms, where they endure 14 to 17 weeks of torment chained inside a crate so small that they can’t even turn around.
The breast is best! Won’t you give cows and their babies a break and our health a boost by switching from cow’s milk to breast milk in Ben and Jerry’s ice cream? Thank you for your consideration.
Sincerely,
Tracy Reiman
Executive Vice President
Give Me A Break,
with all do respect if you are not allowed to kill animals you shouldnt be allowed to even if you are kind to them (or even save there lives.)If you can it shouldnt make a diffrence if you are cruel to them if you are allowed to eat the meat unless clearly specified otherwise by the torah (such as by schita), of course there is a seperate issur to be cruel to animals, but to say the torah made the laws of schita and then commanded us to bring animals as korbonos ,very cleary states that it is okay for pepole to eat meat and then chazal proceed to tell us that we should eat meat on shabbos and yom tov but only means all that in a case were the animals owe you there lives seems to be a bit of a stretch, besides for the point that were do you get the idea that saving somthings life should be a reason you can kill it?
oh and that human breast milk thing eeewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!!!!!
BS”D
See Rabbeinu Bachaye, Parshas Acharei Mos.
And since when do we pasken by him? I did not know that he supersedes the Shulchan Aruch and Remo!
Give Me a Break: it is very shlecht!the taste would be extremely affected.
gmab: because in their response, they said that.
the fact that you think this idea is good, shows how much you drank of the liberal, save the planet, whales and tress crowd!
gmab: and who says nowadays that the methods of farming used are assur? You? The big Rabbonim at PETA? No major Rav paskens that the methods are assur.
Even R’ Kook, who is held up as the example of a Jewish Rabbi who was a vegetarian, wasn’t really one. Do some research, and you’ll see that. He did hold that when Moshiach comes, the world will revert to what it was originally, and we won’t eat meat. Until then, however, he never said it was assur. His son, R’ Tzvi Yehudah, was a vegetarian for a short time, but because of health reasons, not halachic concerns.
gmab: you are wrong. see, before teh beis hamikdash, tehre were these things called bamos. everyone had one in their backyard, or communal ones. now in order to eat meat, you had to shecht it on this mizbayach type thing. these people were not noach. they were decndents of noach, as are we, and teh animals are discendants of the ones on ncoahs ship. so they owe their existence to noach, but he isnt around, so we yarshen that right. see how that works. very simple. also, sorry to tell you, but people ate meat before noach. they started to eat meat after adam and chava left gan eden.
Give Me a Break:
“Just because the Torah says “You may eat meat” does not mean “You SHALL eat meat.”
I see i’m trailing along the lost momentum of this post,
but i’d like to address the aforementioned comment you made.
We are supposed to eat kosher animals as to give them their tikkun & bring them to
a higher madregah on the ladder of Domeim, Tzo’meach, Chai, M’daber, Yehudi,
by reciting the blessing on them & eating them we are doing them a great
spiriual kindness, thus achieving (one) of their
purposes. (This a Chassidic & Kabbalistic approach) however i assume the latter
would sit well with you. (you seem to be from the “i’m spiritual type”)
I say this with the highest regard.
As for peta, they put animals at a higher level than humans
thus totally missing the boat, like a certain furer Y”S V’zichro
making their actual agenda twisted & wrong.
Give Me A Break,
with all do respect,
if you are not allowed to kill animals you shouldnt be allowed to even if you are kind to them (or even save there lives.)
If you can it shouldnt make a diffrence if you are cruel to them if you are allowed to eat the meat unless clearly specified otherwise by the torah (such as by schita), of course there is a seperate issur to be cruel to animals, but to say the torah made the laws of schita and then commanded us to bring animals as korbonos ,very cleary states that it is okay for pepole to eat meat and then chazal proceed to tell us that we should eat meat on shabbos and yom tov but only means all that in a case were the animals owe you there lives seems to be a bit of a stretch,
besides for the point that were do you get the idea that saving somthings life should be a reason you can kill it?
I”ve been following this tread and still remain true to my original assertation about the purpose of animals in the world. (That they were given to us to use in our lives as well as our service to Hashem).
Besides all of the halachos that we have in the Torah from the Korbonos that we (Korban pesach) and cohanimm must eat, plus the laws of shchitah, basar v’cholov and so we can also look at our Avos to see what their opinions were.
Avroham who not only shected an Ayil in place of his son (remember he was commanded to offer Yitzchok, it was afterward when he was commanded to stop that he looked up and saw the Ayil) but when he had 3 strangers come visit him after his bris milah, he shected 3 diffrent cows in order to give each one his own tounge. Seems to be excessive if we were not suppose to eat animals.
Yitzchok who wished to give over his brochos to Eisv commanded him to go and hunt an animal so that he would have a good meal and be in good spirits to give the brochos properly. Kind of takes away the moment if eating an animal is a bad thing. (ALSO One of the reasons also given was to give Aisov the mitzvah of Kivod Ov and make him more worthy to receive them. If eating meat is wrong, it’s kind of counter productive)
Yaakov who with the guidance of his mother shected goats to cover his hands and neck with skins and for his mother to cook in place of the meal that his father was expecting. So in a sence they added more animals giving up thier lives which when going under the guidance that eating animals is wrong would be a mitzvah boh L’avaeira.
None of them where in the Te’iva so I don’t know what debt the animal kingcome owed to them.
Give Me a Break: we dont take care of our animals better then in the year of the flood, literally! are you insane? dont believe everything peta says. do you know they have killed in their basement in virginia more dogs then any other agency in the world? they are hypocrites.
just out of curiosity, how do we treat animals poorer then they did in the time of avraham avinu? please tell me. as far as i know, avrohom and yitzchok didnt have stun guns, nor for that matter 12 gauge shotguns to blow the animals head straight off the body.
Apropos to the title of this thread, though maybe not where it’s going, yesterday I saw a car with a PETA bumber sticker, and a bumper sticker that said, Get hooked on fish, not drugs. Couldn’t reconcile the two till I got close up and saw the small print: Under PETA it said, People Eating Tasty Animals.
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