The people of the nations are not
limited in the food they are allowed to eat, except
the eating of living flesh or the flesh and blood
of a human being. There are also those authorities
who are of the opinion that a Noahide should not eat
the flesh of a dead animal unless killed for the specific
purpose of eating its flesh.
These are the main
points to the Jewish law (Halachah): This ritual law
requires that the animal be slaughtered by severing
the trachea and carotid artery in one stroke. This
causes the least possible suffering to the animal.
The animal must be totally dead with all muscular
and nerve flexing abated before one would be permitted
to eat it. The lungs must be checked to determine
that the animal was not afflicted with certain illnesses
that would cause fatality according to the guidelines
of the Jewish law.
Animals for eating
The people of other
nations are allowed to eat all kinds of animals. Though
there is a difference even for non-Jews between kosher
and not kosher species, this is mainly regarding the
sacrificial ritual and not for eating purposes.
[Why is it permitted
for Noahides to eat any kind of animal whereas all
animals were prohibited to Adam? It is written (Bereshit
9:3), “Every living thing that moves upon the
earth shall be (as) food for you.” Every living
thing that moves includes cattle, beasts, birds, and
even the fish of the sea. All of these are called
“living things that move” (Ramban). Meat,
which was prohibited to Adam, was permitted to Noah
because (a) it was because of him and for his needs
that G-d spared the animals; were it not for man they
would not have been spared (cf. 6:7); (b) he toiled
over them and attended to their needs in the ark.
Of him it is said (Psalms 128:2): “You shall
eat from the toil of your hands.” He had thus
acquired rights over them (Or HaChayim). “They
were saved in an ark which you toiled to build; i.e.
their salvation came through you; they are therefore
yours to do with as you please like the green herbs
of the field” (Bechor Shor; Chizkuni). “As
the green herbage I have given you everything.”
Though I permitted only herbage, but not flesh, to
Adam, I give you the same right to everything that
he had for herbage” (Rashi). R’ Bachya
and Chizkuni comment that the comparison to green
herbage is noteworthy: Lest one think that everything
was permitted, G-d qualified His permission by comparing
it to herbage. Just as some herbs are beneficial to
man while others are unfit for food and even poisonous,
so among the animals and birds there are those that
are permitted by the Torah and those that are prohibited
(see comm. of Chavel to his ed. of R’ Bachya).
This explains why, in spite of the general permission
which was granted to Noah to consume meat, it is important
that the Noahide not eat meat taken from a living
animal, and the Jew eat only certain species slaughtered
according to the Jewish law. Malbim explains that
it is logical and desirable for a lower form of life
to be eaten and absorbed into a higher form. Therefore,
animals eat plant life, thus elevating it, and humans
eat animals, elevating them to become part of intelligent
man. (O that man would be intelligent!)]
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