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| HOWYADOIN? |
Is any meat today kosher?
When I served on the Cape Beth
Din in South Africa, I had to join my colleagues in visiting the
slaughterhouses and checking up on the shochtim. The kosher
slaughterhouse in Cape Town was part of a general slaughterhouse complex
enabling me to view the process of killing animals in both places. What
I saw convinced me that while non-kosher slaughter was quicker and more
“aesthetic” than kosher slaughter, it failed in its claim to be more
compassionate in its methods.
In
the non-kosher slaughterhouse, cows and sheep were herded at a rapid
pace into the assembly line where electrodes hanging down from the
ceiling were punched against their heads by a worker. (This was
considered the most humane method of slaughter. Poleaxing is even more
commonplace.) However it was plainly evident that the pace at which the
animals were passing meant that the electrocution was only partially
successful before many animals were strung up and painfully killed. The
kosher slaughter was less rapid and the shochet gave “personal
attention” to each cow or sheep, ensuring that his knife severed the
trachea and esophagus with one swift gesture, making sure that the
animal died immediately. I have no doubt that kosher slaughter is
overwhelmingly more humane (even if less “aesthetic”) than the
non-kosher method of slaughter and when I was Chief Rabbi of Ireland and
responsible for all the kosher slaughter there, I became even more
convinced of this.
However these experiences also introduced me
to other factors involved in the livestock trade leading to slaughter;
and over the years I became more and more aware of their implications.
Modern factory farming involves not only
quantities of livestock that had previously been unimaginable, but also
conditions and treatment that in the past would have led religiously
observant Jews to consider the consumption of such creatures as
forbidden by Jewish law .
Some of the greatest halachic
authorities of modern times such as Rabbi Moshe Feinstein and Rabbi Haim
David Halevy, both of blessed memory, declared foie gras (goose liver
produced by force feeding geese) and veal (the anemic flesh of a calf,
denied light and movement) to be prohibited, as their production
egregiously transgresses the Jewish prohibition of za’ar baalei hayim, causing cruelty to animals that is not essential for human consumption.
Now let’s leave alone for the moment the
question of what is really necessary today for healthy living; these
rabbis were simply stating the well-known fundamental Jewish teaching
that prohibits the maltreatment of animals. However anyone familiar with
the contemporary livestock trade will know that such animal
maltreatment has become the norm.
Most cows for slaughter are kept and
transported in severely restricted confines and their horns are cut or
burnt off without any anesthetic to prevent them damaging one another in
such confined areas. They are pumped with hormones and antibiotics that
change their physiology and restrict their natural functioning.
One should also note that these hormones and
antibiotics are retained in the flesh consumed by humans, with many
negative consequences.
The situation is even worse for dairy cows. In
order to induce maximal lactation which produces litres of milk for
human consumption, calves are immediately taken away from their mothers
(in direct contravention of the Biblical prohibition, Leviticus 22:27);
and the hormones pumped into them enlarge their udders to such an extent
that dairy cows are often incapable of walking.
An analysis by an American Orthodox halachic authority of the internal organs of dairy cow carcasses showed major organ distortions that would have rendered them treif, i.e. prohibited for Jewish consumption. This also has halachic ramifications regarding the milk of such treif cows.
Chickens in today’s factory farms grow three
times as fast as they did fifty years ago as a result of selective
breeding programs and the use of antibiotics. This leads to crippling
bone disorders and spinal defects causing acute pain and difficulty in
moving.
And as far as eggs are concerned – organic or
otherwise – in order to guarantee maximal production, male chicks are
killed after birth, thrown alive into grinders or suffocated in bags.
Enough of the horror stories! It should be
evident to anyone with eyes in his or her head that virtually all animal
products on the market today are the result of practices that
categorically contravene Jewish law and ethics. And even if eating these
products is considered a halachic obligation (which is not the case), under these conditions it would be a mitzvah habaah baveirah, the product of illegitimate means which disqualifies the ends.
It should be clear that the rationales of
Rabbi Moshe Feinstein and Rabbi Hayim David Halevi are not just relevant
today to foie gras and veal, but apply across the livestock/animal food
production industries.
Kashrut involves more than just the way the animal‘s throat is cut and the checking of its vital organs. Kashrut involves the whole relationship between humans and the animal world. Indeed our sages say specifically in relation to shechitah that “the mitzvot were only given in order to refine people” (Genesis Rabbah, 34; Leviticus Rabbah, 13.)
If at point Z the animal’s throat was cut the
right way and its internal organs checked, but from A to Y all
injunctions and prohibitions have been ignored and desecrated, how can
that product really be called kosher?
Why is there virtually no official rabbinic dissent let alone opposition to such practices?
Some of it is due to ignorance, but most of
all these facts are uncomfortable and it is much easier to avoid or deny
them. But might it not also have to do with the fact that the kosher
food industry, and all the rabbinic supervision and authorization
inextricably bound up with it, constitutes an enormous industry relating
to the livelihoods, interests and power of myriads of people? One
wonders whether it is even possible to stop the train of this enormous
immoral enterprise where both legitimate and not so legitimate interests
are so inextricably intertwined.
Modern technology and innovation, which
currently compound the evil, may eventually offer us ways out of this
imbroglio. Nevertheless, in the meantime if not for longer, responsible
rabbinic leadership should be advocating a plant based diet as much as
possible, as the most kosher diet available for most people today.
It is perfectly feasible in our modern world
to obtain full nutrients for a healthy body without needing to be party
to such immorality. And all this is not to mention other ethical issues,
such as greater and more equitable distribution of food resources, and
the environmental damage done by the livestock trade (which is greater
than all the forms of transport in the world put together. See
“Livestock’s Dark Shadow” issued by the UN Food and Agriculture
Organization.)
Of course there were great rabbis such as
Rabbi Avraham HaCohen Kook and before him Rabbi Yosef Albo and others,
who envisioned a messianic age in which there is no killing of animals
(and which will even be reflected in the Temple service itself). But
even if you are not attracted to such visions, in today’s modern world
the more one’s diet is plant based the more one is truly keeping kosher.
—
Rabbi David Rosen served as the senior
rabbi of the largest Orthodox Jewish congregation in South Africa, and
as Chief Rabbi of Ireland. He is currently the American Jewish
Committees International Director of Interreligious Affairs, based in
Jerusalem.