Grace and TruthThis website is under construction ! |
|
|
Home Afrikaans |
Home -- Content: Series 7 (Laws) -- Translation: English -- Book: 1 (Tora) -- Part: 2 (Negative) -- Prohibition: 172 -- Text The Sharia of Moses in the TORA 172 - EATING ANY UNCLEAN ANIMALDeuteronomy 14:7-8 -- 7 “Nevertheless, of those that chew the cud or have cloven hooves, you shall not eat, such as these: the camel, the hare, and the rock hyrax; for they chew the cud but do not have cloven hooves; they are unclean for you. 8 Also the swine is unclean for you, because it has cloven hooves, yet does not chew the cud; you shall not eat their flesh or touch their dead carcasses.”
In rationalizing the commandments pertaining to forbidden foods, Maimonides says: “I maintain that food which is forbidden by the Law is unwholesome. There is nothing among the forbidden kinds of food whose injurious character is doubted except pork and fat; but in these cases also the doubt is not justified. For pork contains more moisture than is necessary for human food, and too much superfluous matter. The principal reason why the Law forbids swine’s flesh is that the habits and food of the swine are very dirty and loathsome… A saying of our sages declares: ‘The mouth of a swine is as dirty as dung itself.’”* * Ber. 25a; Moreh Nebuchim III, 48
According to the Mishnah: “If a clean animal gives birth to a species of unclean animal, it may be eaten; but if an unclean animal gives birth to a species of clean animal, it may not be eaten, for what issues from the unclean is unclean, and what issues from the clean is clean.”* * Bek. 5b
|