Where's the Beef?

[TheKingOfImmortality]

Why do some religons put a band on eating certain kinds of meat?

Weather its
Pork
Beef
or all meat in genral?

 

[Nooj]

Some claim that God instituted it for health reasons. Others say that God did it for the old proverbial and giggles. God's laws don't have to make sense. In fact, in a perverse sort of way, I can see why God would establish ridiculous laws. The more ridiculous the laws are, the more faith a person has who follows them.

 

[Arthra]

I think originally banning pork was probably health based and maybe divinely inspired too...

Visiting an open market on some places and seeing a slaughtered animal with flies and odor would probably convince most of us eating it was a big risk.

Also there are bans of eating dead game..

Baha'i Faith has no restrictions of food but some statements by Abdul-Baha indicate vegetarianism will be the future preferred diet... and indeed it's much cheaper and easier to feed a population on vegetables than meat.

Visiting the Carribean I found that people there had to import all their meat...but around them was a lush trapical jungle with palms cocanuts and other products..basically meat presents too many problems and there are many things that can go wrong..like mad cow disease... growth hormones and anti biotics that are pumped into the animals find their way to you!

- Art

 

[ChavaK]

We don't eat certain meats because G-d commands it.
Why He does, I do not know.
This commandment is known as a chukim; a commandment
for which no reason is given, nor any reason apparent.

 

[PatrickofDetroit]

Because rules are the only thing that keep us from acting like total animals.... oh wait.

 

[Jane_the_Bane]

It's the old taboo game. Cultures have a tendency to erroneously link certain acts to certain events, thus establishing rules whose purpose is not readily apparent to later generations.

Say, for example, that a tribesman had sewn himself a coat from the pelt of a rare animal, intending it to be a mark of honour and dignity. Soon afterwards, he drowns in a river while trying to cross, due to a cramped leg. The other people immediately attribute it to the slaying of the animal, and declare that it brought a curse upon its killer. Henceforth, the animal is taboo.

Note also how the dead are usually taboo, to the point where mourners are excluded from the community for a time. That one could actually be connected to the (unknown) risk of infection with some potentially dangerous germ. People noticed that the risk of getting sick increased around the recently deceased, and believed that this was due to a "spiritual uncleanliness" of the dead body.

That's how "divine" laws come into being, basically.

 

[ChordatesLegacy]

Some claim that God instituted it for health reasons. Others say that God did it for the old proverbial and giggles. God's laws don't have to make sense. In fact, in a perverse sort of way, I can see why God would establish ridiculous laws. The more ridiculous the laws are, the more faith a person has who follows them.

The reason I favour for the Jews and Muslims not eating pork, is that in the distant past they tended to be nomadic particularly in the more aria regions of the Middle East and North Africa. It is a common known fact amongst farmers that pigs cannot be herded; therefore they became associated with settlements, which was not the lifestyle of Middle East nomadic wanderers, and therefore seen as alian to their way of life.

All this of course happened long before Christianity and Islam got hold of the people, but customs are always incorporated into religions, makes it easier to indoctrinate people.

 

[ChavaK]

The reason I favour for the Jews and Muslims not eating pork, is that in the distant past they tended to be nomadic particularly in the more aria regions of the Middle East and North Africa. It is a common known fact amongst farmers that pigs cannot be herded; therefore they became associated with settlements, which was not the lifestyle of Middle East nomadic wanderers, and therefore seen as alian to their way of life.

But the fallacy with that arguement is that Jews were
forbidden to eat any meat that came from an animal that did
not have split hooves or chew it's cud; the ban was not
limited to just pork.

So camels, which can easily be herded could not be eaten either.
Nor any wild animals that did not fulfill the cloven hooves/cud requirement.
That eliminates much more than just pork.

Also, sea life had to had fins and scales; no insects (except
for a select few) and birds also had to meet certain
criterion in order to be kosher to eat.

 

[ChavaK]

It's the old taboo game. Cultures have a tendency to erroneously link certain acts to certain events, thus establishing rules whose purpose is not readily apparent to later generations.

Say, for example, that a tribesman had sewn himself a coat from the pelt of a rare animal, intending it to be a mark of honour and dignity. Soon afterwards, he drowns in a river while trying to cross, due to a cramped leg. The other people immediately attribute it to the slaying of the animal, and declare that it brought a curse upon its killer. Henceforth, the animal is taboo.

Note also how the dead are usually taboo, to the point where mourners are excluded from the community for a time. That one could actually be connected to the (unknown) risk of infection with some potentially dangerous germ. People noticed that the risk of getting sick increased around the recently deceased, and believed that this was due to a "spiritual uncleanliness" of the dead body.

That's how "divine" laws come into being, basically.

There are many commandments given where we
are specifically given a reason for doing it. Others, such as kosher
rules, no reasons are given.
Also, as it applies to Jews, the commandment is to eat only animals
with split hooves and that chew their cuds. It is not limited to a specific animal, although most people of course immediately think
of pork.

 

[Jane_the_Bane]

There are many commandments given where we
are specifically given a reason for doing it. Others, such as kosher
rules, no reasons are given.
Also, as it applies to Jews, the commandment is to eat only animals
with split hooves and that chew their cuds. It is not limited to a specific animal, although most people of course immediately think
of pork.

How does that contradict anything of what I said? Those laws which you'd refer to as "chukim" would clearly fall into the anthropological category I mentioned.
It might be tempting to plead for a special status with regards to one's own religion or tradition - but at the end of the day, it looks just like any other taboo rule of that type.

(And as for rules that *do* make sense and/or are explained in a fashion that sounds somewhat reasonable: society can only function within certain parameters, so naturally, each and every society that evolves past a simple clan structure will feature rules that make a moderately harmonious coexistence possible. Religions usually attribute these to their respective deities, yet it seems that no stone tablets are necessary for these principles to perpetuate themselves: other social animals adhere to them as well, in spite of the absence of language or writing.)

 

[ChavaK]

How does that contradict anything of what I said? Those laws which you'd refer to as "chukim" would clearly fall into the anthropological category I mentioned.
It might be tempting to plead for a special status with regards to one's own religion or tradition - but at the end of the day, it looks just like any other taboo rule of that type.

No contradiction; just merely pointing out that because there is
no direct explanation given as to why a particular mitzvot was
given, neither does it mean there is no divine reason for such
a mitzvot for being given.

Also, when you speak about Jews, the fact that there were 12
tribes, and clans before that, who necessarily did not live
together, makes it harder for me to believe that the chukim
were from culturally based events..

 

[talkingmonkey]

Do not eat camels - they were better used to transport people and goods
Do not eat shellfish - it's the desert...got a refrigerator (unless they cured it with salt)?
Do not eat pork - they live in their own filth, and I guess cos they cannot be herded
Do not eat beef - better used to plow fields to grow crops than to be eaten.
do not eat animals in general - Karmic flow. Even if you did not kill the animal, but eat it, you will absorb the negative Karma that flows through the stages from death of animal to consumption of it.

my perception anyway

 

[peepnklown]

It all comes down to cultural traditions that got a God stamped placed on them.

 

[GeratTzedek]

People do all sorts of hypothesizing why G-d would put certain dietary restrictions upon the Jewish people. It certainly does help to keep them seperate from the Nations. It certainly has had good health effects. But in the end, G-d didn't specify His reasons. He only told us what to do, and our obligation is to obey.

 

[InnocentOdion]

I'm sorry people, but "because" or "Because God said so"or "It's a commandment"...this is not a good enough explanation. A little more than this, please.

 

[Rasta]

I'm sorry people, but "because" or "Because God said so"or "It's a commandment"...this is not a good enough explanation. A little more than this, please.

If they had a better explaination, they would have said it.

There are personal hypothesis, but people don't want to speak FOR god, as god did not specify.

I agree. "Because yadda yadda wrote it in a book, and claimed god said" is not good enough for me either.

 

[InnocentOdion]

If they had a better explaination, they would have said it.

There are personal hypothesis, but people don't want to speak FOR god, as god did not specify.

I agree. "Because yadda yadda wrote it in a book, and claimed god said" is not good enough for me either.

Haha.

 

[morningstar2651]

Why do some religons put a band on eating certain kinds of meat?

Weather its
Pork
Beef
or all meat in genral?

Different cultures taboo different foods. Here are a couple excerpts from The Golden Bough.

THUS in primitive society the rules of ceremonial purity observed by divine kings, chiefs, and priests agree in many respects with the rules observed by homicides, mourners, women in childbed, girls at puberty, hunters and fishermen, and so on. To us these various classes of persons appear to differ totally in character and condition; some of them we should call holy, others we might pronounce unclean and polluted. But the savage makes no such moral distinction between them; the conceptions of holiness and pollution are not yet differentiated in his mind. To him the common feature of all these persons is that they are dangerous and in danger, and the danger in which they stand and to which they expose others is what we should call spiritual or ghostly, and therefore imaginary. The danger, however, is not less real because it is imaginary; imagination acts upon man as really as does gravitation, and may kill him as certainly as a dose of prussic acid. To seclude these persons from the rest of the world so that the dreaded spiritual danger shall neither reach them nor spread from them, is the object of the taboos which they have to observe. These taboos act, so to say, as electrical insulators to preserve the spiritual force with which these persons are charged from suffering or inflicting harm by contact with the outer world.

AS MIGHT have been expected, the superstitions of the savage cluster thick about the subject of food; and he abstains from eating many animals and plants, wholesome enough in themselves, which for one reason or another he fancies would prove dangerous or fatal to the eater. Examples of such abstinence are too familiar and far too numerous to quote. But if the ordinary man is thus deterred by superstitious fear from partaking of various foods, the restraints of this kind which are laid upon sacred or tabooed persons, such as kings and priests, are still more numerous and stringent. We have already seen that the Flamen Dialis was forbidden to eat or even name several plants and animals, and that the flesh diet of Egyptian kings was restricted to veal and goose. In antiquity many priests and many kings of barbarous peoples abstained wholly from a flesh diet. The Gangas or fetish priests of the Loango Coast are forbidden to eat or even see a variety of animals and fish, in consequence of which their flesh diet is extremely limited; often they live only on herbs and roots, though they may drink fresh blood. The heir to the throne of Loango is forbidden from infancy to eat pork; from early childhood he is interdicted the use of the cola fruit in company; at puberty he is taught by a priest not to partake of fowls except such as he has himself killed and cooked; and so the number of taboos goes on increasing with his years. In Fernando Po the king after installation is forbidden to eat cocco (arum acaule), deer, and porcupine, which are the ordinary foods of the people. The head chief of the Masai may eat nothing but milk, honey, and the roasted livers of goats; for if he partook of any other food he would lose his power of soothsaying and of compounding charms.

 

[LittleLambofJesus]

I don't restrict myself to any certain foods and have probably eaten things that would make a billy-goat puke.
But seriously, if it poses a health risk to me, I just simply avoid it.
I do enjoy barbecued pork or spare-ribs and have been eating raw oysters for decades and probably every kind of seafood and mean on this planet.
Guess just use common sense and if it is your time to go, it is your time to go. Peace.

 

[morningstar2651]

I don't restrict myself to any certain foods and have probably eaten things that would make a billy-goat puke.
But seriously, if it poses a health risk to me, I just simply avoid it.
I do enjoy barbecued pork or spare-ribs and have been eating raw oysters for decades and probably every kind of seafood and mean on this planet.
Guess just use common sense and if it is your time to go, it is your time to go. Peace.

Agreed. I've tried Vegemite, and it's not for me...but I haven't found any holy books that condemn those who like it.

On the other hand, I absolutely love taramosalata (ταραμοσαλάτ&#945.