ברכת תלמוד תורה
בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְהֹוָה אֱלֹהֵֽינוּ מֶֽלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם אֲשֶׁר קִדְּ֒שָֽׁנוּ בְּמִצְוֹתָיו וְצִוָּנוּ לַעֲסֹק בְּדִבְרֵי תוֹרָה:
Blessing for Torah Study
Blessed are You, Adonai our God, Ruler of the Universe, who has sanctified us with Your commandments, commanding us to immerse ourselves with words of Torah
(מג) אַל־תְּשַׁקְּצוּ֙ אֶת־נַפְשֹׁ֣תֵיכֶ֔ם בְּכָל־הַשֶּׁ֖רֶץ הַשֹּׁרֵ֑ץ וְלֹ֤א תִֽטַּמְּאוּ֙ בָּהֶ֔ם וְנִטְמֵתֶ֖ם בָּֽם׃ (מד) כִּ֣י אֲנִ֣י יְהוָה֮ אֱלֹֽהֵיכֶם֒ וְהִתְקַדִּשְׁתֶּם֙ וִהְיִיתֶ֣ם קְדֹשִׁ֔ים כִּ֥י קָד֖וֹשׁ אָ֑נִי וְלֹ֤א תְטַמְּאוּ֙ אֶת־נַפְשֹׁ֣תֵיכֶ֔ם בְּכָל־הַשֶּׁ֖רֶץ הָרֹמֵ֥שׂ עַל־הָאָֽרֶץ׃ (מה) כִּ֣י ׀ אֲנִ֣י יְהוָ֗ה הַֽמַּעֲלֶ֤ה אֶתְכֶם֙ מֵאֶ֣רֶץ מִצְרַ֔יִם לִהְיֹ֥ת לָכֶ֖ם לֵאלֹהִ֑ים וִהְיִיתֶ֣ם קְדֹשִׁ֔ים כִּ֥י קָד֖וֹשׁ אָֽנִי׃ (מו) זֹ֣את תּוֹרַ֤ת הַבְּהֵמָה֙ וְהָע֔וֹף וְכֹל֙ נֶ֣פֶשׁ הַֽחַיָּ֔ה הָרֹמֶ֖שֶׂת בַּמָּ֑יִם וּלְכָל־נֶ֖פֶשׁ הַשֹּׁרֶ֥צֶת עַל־הָאָֽרֶץ׃ (מז) לְהַבְדִּ֕יל בֵּ֥ין הַטָּמֵ֖א וּבֵ֣ין הַטָּהֹ֑ר וּבֵ֤ין הַֽחַיָּה֙ הַֽנֶּאֱכֶ֔לֶת וּבֵין֙ הַֽחַיָּ֔ה אֲשֶׁ֖ר לֹ֥א תֵאָכֵֽל׃ (פ)
(43) You shall not draw abomination upon yourselves through anything that swarms; you shall not make yourselves unclean therewith and thus become unclean. (44) For I, Adonai, am your God: you shall sanctify yourselves and be holy, for I am holy. You shall not make yourselves unclean through any swarming thing that moves upon the earth. (45) For I, Adonai, am the One who brought you up from the land of Egypt to be your God: you shall be holy, for I am holy. (46) These are the instructions concerning animals, birds, all living creatures that move in water, and all creatures that swarm on earth, (47) for distinguishing between the unclean and the clean, between the living things that may be eaten and the living things that may not be eaten.
Maimonides, Guide for the Perplexed
I maintain that the food which is forbidden by the Torah is unwholesome... Pork contains more moisture than is necessary and too much of superfluous matter. The principle reason why the Torah forbids swine's flesh is to be found in the circumstance that its habits and its food are very dirty and loathsome...
I maintain that the food which is forbidden by the Torah is unwholesome... Pork contains more moisture than is necessary and too much of superfluous matter. The principle reason why the Torah forbids swine's flesh is to be found in the circumstance that its habits and its food are very dirty and loathsome...
Sefer HaHinuch
The body is the tool of the soul through which it accomplishes its function... For this reason our perfect Torah separated us from harmful factors. This is the common-sense reason for the Torah's dietary prohibitions... the True Physician who admonished us regarding them [forbidden foods] is wiser than us.
The body is the tool of the soul through which it accomplishes its function... For this reason our perfect Torah separated us from harmful factors. This is the common-sense reason for the Torah's dietary prohibitions... the True Physician who admonished us regarding them [forbidden foods] is wiser than us.
Akedat Yitzchak
The dietary laws are not as some have asserted motivated by therapeutic considerations God forbid! Were that so, the Torah would be denigrated to the status of a minor medical treatise and worse than that
Abravanel
The Divine law did not come to take the place of a medical handbook but to protect our spiritual health. It therefore forbade foods which revolt the pure and intellectual soul, clogging the human temperament, demoralizing the character, promoting and unclean spirit, defiling in thought and deed, driving out the pure and holy spirit.... spiritual rather than physical source of their prohibition.
The dietary laws are not as some have asserted motivated by therapeutic considerations God forbid! Were that so, the Torah would be denigrated to the status of a minor medical treatise and worse than that
Abravanel
The Divine law did not come to take the place of a medical handbook but to protect our spiritual health. It therefore forbade foods which revolt the pure and intellectual soul, clogging the human temperament, demoralizing the character, promoting and unclean spirit, defiling in thought and deed, driving out the pure and holy spirit.... spiritual rather than physical source of their prohibition.
Rachel Adler, "The Boundary at the Table"
The need for boundaries is universal. Every society has basic categories of what is considered edible and what is considered inedible, who are kin and who are not, who is and who is not a permissible sexual partner. These categories form fundamental social boundaries. In her groundbreaking study Purity and Danger: An Analysis of the Concepts of Pollution and Taboo, anthropologist Mary Douglas argues that both bodies and societies feel the need for boundaries (New York: Routledge Classics, 2002).
Leviticus asks us to practice justice, especially in our acts of eating. In our dietary code, Mary Douglas observes, the body of the worshiper is made analogous to the sanctuary, which is also analogous to the holy mountain Sinai: all three are places where God is encountered (Leviticus as Literature [London: Oxford University Press, 1999], p. 134). Anything that will render the altar impure will render the body of the worshiper impure. Hence, all fruits and vegetables, seeds and grains, are pure. But the only land animals Leviticus permits as food are the flock and herd animals Israelites had. For secular use, there are also the dairy foods the flocks and herds produce, even though these are not offered as sacrifices. The animals themselves are eaten only at the sanctuary, after being offered to God. Meat then, is a special food for special occasions, and when you take an animal's life, you sprinkle its blood on the altar of the Source of life and eat reverently what is permissible to you.
[Part 2]
Ecological arguments such as Pollan's and Kingsolver's support setting boundaries of some sort in place, but a special Jewish argument needs to be made for the boundaries of kashrut, even for the wider post-Levitical boundaries of Rabbinic dietary laws. Why should Reform Jews consider keeping them? First, we should consider the dietary laws because they remind us that eating can be a holy act. A little later in Leviticus we will be told, "You shall be holy, for I, the Eternal your God, am holy" (Leviticus 19:2). And Nachmanides explains, "Restrict yourselves [P'rushim y'hiu ]. Sanctify yourself with what is permitted to you" (Ramban on Leviticus 19:2 ad loc.). We should be sparing and use what is permitted us in a holy way. What way is that? It is eating mindfully and reverently. It is appreciating our fruits and vegetables and grains, and buying those whose growing has not polluted the earth with toxic pesticides, which also harmed the people who cultivated them.
Second, we should think about keeping kosher proactively, planning not just to take on the current practice, but to envision and create a better practice. It is possible to build humane, ethical, locally based, free-range kosher meat businesses. That few have done it yet does not mean that it cannot be done. Slaughtering free-range animals locally, humanely, on a small scale, and eating meat more sparingly will bring us closer to the ways of our ancestors, where all living things were revered as God's creations, not to be unmindfully consumed.
Third, we should consider keeping kosher because Jews still need boundaries to maintain our distinctness as a culture and religion, so that we can preserve continuity with the "Judaisms" of the past and pass on a Judaism with integrity to our inheritors. And finally, it is more possible to feel humility when we think of consuming as a God-given privilege with restrictions attached rather than an unlimited right. We did not create the world, and we do an uneven job of sustaining it. God's desire for otherness put us on this planet. According to kabbalistic literature, God contracted God's self, restricted God's self (tzimtzum), to create room for what is other than God to exist. What would it mean if we were able to do an act of tzimtzum when we sit down at the table?
The need for boundaries is universal. Every society has basic categories of what is considered edible and what is considered inedible, who are kin and who are not, who is and who is not a permissible sexual partner. These categories form fundamental social boundaries. In her groundbreaking study Purity and Danger: An Analysis of the Concepts of Pollution and Taboo, anthropologist Mary Douglas argues that both bodies and societies feel the need for boundaries (New York: Routledge Classics, 2002).
Leviticus asks us to practice justice, especially in our acts of eating. In our dietary code, Mary Douglas observes, the body of the worshiper is made analogous to the sanctuary, which is also analogous to the holy mountain Sinai: all three are places where God is encountered (Leviticus as Literature [London: Oxford University Press, 1999], p. 134). Anything that will render the altar impure will render the body of the worshiper impure. Hence, all fruits and vegetables, seeds and grains, are pure. But the only land animals Leviticus permits as food are the flock and herd animals Israelites had. For secular use, there are also the dairy foods the flocks and herds produce, even though these are not offered as sacrifices. The animals themselves are eaten only at the sanctuary, after being offered to God. Meat then, is a special food for special occasions, and when you take an animal's life, you sprinkle its blood on the altar of the Source of life and eat reverently what is permissible to you.
[Part 2]
Ecological arguments such as Pollan's and Kingsolver's support setting boundaries of some sort in place, but a special Jewish argument needs to be made for the boundaries of kashrut, even for the wider post-Levitical boundaries of Rabbinic dietary laws. Why should Reform Jews consider keeping them? First, we should consider the dietary laws because they remind us that eating can be a holy act. A little later in Leviticus we will be told, "You shall be holy, for I, the Eternal your God, am holy" (Leviticus 19:2). And Nachmanides explains, "Restrict yourselves [P'rushim y'hiu ]. Sanctify yourself with what is permitted to you" (Ramban on Leviticus 19:2 ad loc.). We should be sparing and use what is permitted us in a holy way. What way is that? It is eating mindfully and reverently. It is appreciating our fruits and vegetables and grains, and buying those whose growing has not polluted the earth with toxic pesticides, which also harmed the people who cultivated them.
Second, we should think about keeping kosher proactively, planning not just to take on the current practice, but to envision and create a better practice. It is possible to build humane, ethical, locally based, free-range kosher meat businesses. That few have done it yet does not mean that it cannot be done. Slaughtering free-range animals locally, humanely, on a small scale, and eating meat more sparingly will bring us closer to the ways of our ancestors, where all living things were revered as God's creations, not to be unmindfully consumed.
Third, we should consider keeping kosher because Jews still need boundaries to maintain our distinctness as a culture and religion, so that we can preserve continuity with the "Judaisms" of the past and pass on a Judaism with integrity to our inheritors. And finally, it is more possible to feel humility when we think of consuming as a God-given privilege with restrictions attached rather than an unlimited right. We did not create the world, and we do an uneven job of sustaining it. God's desire for otherness put us on this planet. According to kabbalistic literature, God contracted God's self, restricted God's self (tzimtzum), to create room for what is other than God to exist. What would it mean if we were able to do an act of tzimtzum when we sit down at the table?
May We All Be Happy
by Lior Tsarfaty / words based on Buddhist Metta practice
Capo 5: G Em C D G
May we all be happy
May we all be safe
May we all be free
All of us as one
by Lior Tsarfaty / words based on Buddhist Metta practice
Capo 5: G Em C D G
May we all be happy
May we all be safe
May we all be free
All of us as one
Resources:
Rachel Adler on Modern Kashrut:
https://reformjudaism.org/learning/torah-study/torah-commentary/boundary-table-forbidden-foods-and-us-0
Ayelet Tsabari, "Yemini Soup": http://themagazineschool.ca/files/Yemeni%20Soup%20and%20Other%20Recipes.pdf
929 Leviticus 11:
https://www.929.org.il/lang/en/page/101
Rachel Adler on Modern Kashrut:
https://reformjudaism.org/learning/torah-study/torah-commentary/boundary-table-forbidden-foods-and-us-0
Ayelet Tsabari, "Yemini Soup": http://themagazineschool.ca/files/Yemeni%20Soup%20and%20Other%20Recipes.pdf
929 Leviticus 11:
https://www.929.org.il/lang/en/page/101