Dear Aharon,



In the essay Morality in Halacha we have clarified “even though there are natural morals common to most humans, such as pity and generosity, the Jew must use them only because Halacha commands him to, as part of worshipping G-d, and not because this is how he naturally feels! As brought in Tractate Megillah 25a, where it is explained why one who says in his prayers, ‘to a bird’s nest Your mercy reaches’ should be silenced–because ‘He makes the holy One blessed be He’s traits into mercy when they are naught but decrees.’ And Rashi explains: ‘To place upon us His yoke to announce that we are His servants and the keepers of His commandments.’ A commandment-fulfilling Jew is forbidden to beg for mercy except in those cases where mercy is a religious decree.”



A wonderful example of this is the Talmudic Sages’ discussion of the prohibition against muzzling an ox while it is threshing: “You shall not muzzle an ox while it is threshing” (Deuteronomy 25:4). The command shows the Torah’s sensitivity towards animals, as is explained in Sefer HaChinuch (commandment 596): “At the root of the precept lies the purpose to educate us that our spirit should be of fine character, choosing decency and clinging to it, and seeking after kindness and compassion. By training it in this even with animals, which were created for no other purpose but to serve us, to have pity on them, to give them a share out of the toil of their flesh, the spirit will take its path in this habit to do good for human beings…In this fitting path the chosen people of holiness are to go.”



Even so, the sages of the Talmud (Bava Metzia 90a) discuss whether a Jew may give his cattle to a gentile and ask him to muzzle the animal during threshing (that is, to bypass “G-d” and to thresh with a muzzled ox, so the grain will not be eaten). Their conclusion is that one may do so according to the Torah, but that the rabbis forbade it.



Note well two things:

1. According to the Talmudic sages, the demands for mercy, for prevention of pain to animals, apply only to Jews and not to gentiles. Gentiles are permitted to be cruel, so what “divine mercy” is there here when G-d permits most of the world’s population to cause pain to animals? Can this be called “Divine justice”? What is this like? Were the State of Israel to pass a law forbidding the force-feeding of geese, but apply that law only to Jews, all who heard of it would laugh…

2. A Jew is required to act mercifully toward animals, but the author of the Torah gave him a way to be cruel to them.



So you see that even on matters of mercy and kindness religious Jews do not act from basic human nature, but only due to “Divine” commands and laws. Were a sense of mercy to be their primary motive they would not dare ask about the topic above.



We will bring you some more of the Talmudic discussion of this issue (Bava Metzia 90b):

1. If one puts a thorn into the cow’s mouth so she cannot eat, does one have to take it out before the threshing or not?

2. If a lion stands near the threshing area and due to fear the ox cannot eat, does one have to chase off the lion or not?

3. If one spreads cloth over the grain to be threshed so that the ox cannot eat it, does one violate a Torah prohibition or not?



Sincerely,



Daat Emet

Hello.



You support our words. The religious public, in the name of “religious righteousness,” commits the supreme evil: defining all who are not Jews as animals.

Rabbi Kook, in the book Orot, Orot Yisrael 5:10 (pg. 156) expresses your sentiments. “The difference between the soul of the Jew, its independence, its internal aspirations, goals, characteristics, and stances, and that of the gentile at all levels is greater and deeper than the difference between the soul of man and that of beast. Between the latter the difference is only quantitative, while between the former the difference is qualitative.”



There is no greater nastiness or evil than distorting facts through words, committing a crime and calling it justice, discriminating against women and calling it equality, murdering people and calling it zealotry.



Sincerely,



Daat Emet