[Janine]

Why do Jewish people not mix meat and milk?

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Name : Janine, Gender : F, City : Melbourne, State : CT Country : Australia, 

[Brett]

There is a passage in the Torah (our holy text) that states not to boil a kid in its mothers milk, meaning the meat products come from the very animals that give us dairy, and therefore it is unclean (not to mention unhealthy) to eat them together!

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Name : Brett, Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Jewish, Age : 14, City : For Worth, State : TX Country : United States, Occupation : Student, Education level : Less than High School Diploma, Social class : Middle class, 

[Barb]

Actually, many (I suspect most here in the United States) Jewish people do mix meat and milk, because only the more observant Jews maintain a kosher diet as prescribed in the Torah, and only those who keep kosher have the meat/dairy prohibition. I'm no authority, being a reform Jew relatively ignorant of kosher dietary restrictions, but I've found this web site that explains the background of that rule: http://shamash.org/lists/scj-faq/HTML/faq/06-16.html

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Name : Barb, Gender : F, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Jewish, Age : 46, City : Reading, State : PA Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Upper middle class, 

[shlomo]

a kid shall not be boiled in its mothers milk. these are the words of our law. also many other dietary laws. not easy to be a jew, but wonderful! shlomo.

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Name : shlomo, City : somers, State : CT Country : United States, 

[Lucy Kline]

The not mixing meat and milk comes from God's order not to 'seethe a kid in its mother's milk.' The purpose was not to kill a baby animal in sight of the mother animal, as this would be cruelty to the mother. Somehow in the many interpretations we ended up with not mixing meat and any dairy products. As a Reform Jew also, I have not kept kosher, but many Reform Jews today do and I've learned more about observances that Reform Jews had stopped observing and are beginning again to observe.

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Name : Lucy Kline, Gender : F, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Jewish, Age : 68, City : Cocoa, State : FL Country : United States, Occupation : Housewife, Education level : High School Diploma, Social class : Middle class, 

[Cara]

The Bible says that you shall not boil a calf in its mother's milk. From there the rabbis have interpreted that no meat should be mixed with any milk. That means chicken & beef (meat) cannot be eaten at the same time as any dairy products. So you couldn't have meatloaf and then ice cream for desert. Fish and eggs, oddly enough are not considered meat or dairy! Aside from these weird little factoids, the point of the rule was to have a little more respect for the animal we are eating. The laws of kashrut are not only for purity of food, but also with a mind for humane treatment of animals. It just seems kinda gross to have the calf cooked with it's mother's product, no?

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Name : Cara, Gender : F, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Jewish, Age : 24, City : Washington, State : DC Country : United States, Occupation : Analyst, Education level : 4 Years of College, Social class : Upper middle class, 

[rachel-z]

It is part of the laws of kashrut (keeping kosher). The original biblical injunction was 'Do not seethe a kid in its mother's milk' (apparently a common cooking practice in biblical times). this has been generalized to any combination of milk & meat. The implications are - to demonstrate our compassion toward animals. Bad enough to kill a lamb's kid. But to cook that kid in its own mother's milk adds insult to injury to the mother. Many laws of kashrut protect the sensibilities of animals, e.g. hunting if forbidden. Only trained ritual slaughterer's may kill animals for food (or any reason other than self-defense) & learn to do so in ways that minimize the suffering of the slaughtered animal.

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Name : rachel-z, Gender : F, Religion : Jewish, Age : 52, City : st. louis, State : MO Country : United States, Occupation : writer, Social class : Middle class, 

[Hope]

Most Jewish Kosher laws were created for health reasons, and are continued as a form of respect for the past as well as as a form of cultural identity. The milk and meat thing is twofold: it was started, basically, because thousands of years ago, before the invention of dishwashers, using the same utensils for both meat and dairy could get you sick, due to bacteria growth. The second reason is out of respect for animals - the quote is something like, 'You shall not seethe the calf in its mother's milk.'

Lots of Kosher rules are for similar reasons: No shellfish because it caused hepatitis (and, in some parts of the world, still does) and no pork because there was no way to cure pork back then. Also, Kosher slaughter rules (meaning what makes the meat in your deli 'Kosher') have much to do with making sure the animal dies the quickest and most painless death possible.

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Name : Hope, Gender : Female, Sexual Orientation : Bisexual, Religion : Jewish, Age : 38, City : Pittsburgh, State : PA Country : United States, Education level : 4 Years of College, 

[EJ]

Okay, the previous posts were obviously not posted by Jews who spent 14 years in a Jewish Day School. The 'health' reason is a myth, and there are a plethora of Jews who keep kosher today. I live in New York City and you cannot spit without hitting a kosher butcher or restuaraunt. Thats because there is a demand for it. It says three times in the Torah/Old testament that you cannot cook a kid in its mother's milk. It is to teach us to be sensative to animals. If a cow gave birth to a calf, it would be cruel to cook that calf in the milk just milked from its mother. Many of the Jewish dietary laws are made to make us a more sensative group. With birds, we can only eat those that are not birds of prey, with animals, they must chew their cud and have split hooves, with fish we can only eat those with fins and scales. that eliminates most shellfish that scurry on the bottom of the ocean floor and fish that prey on others. Even the way we kill animals are done in a sensative way. So you will find many Jews all over the world that wait either 1,3 or 6 hours before consuming dairy products after meat to ensure the digestion is complete and the two will not mix.

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Name : EJ, Gender : F, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Jewish, Age : 28, City : New York, State : NY Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, 

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