Erev Chukkat 5771 Para adumah and Shechita ban in Netherlands Rabbi Aaron Goldstein 1 July 2011

The Israelite cult prescribed some fascinating and at times puzzling rituals. Chief among them is the ritual of purification with the ashes of a red cow - parah adomah - that are detailed in this week’s parasha, Chukkat. The purification was needed when one was contaminated by coming into contact with a corpse, in this case in connection with combat. My mind boggles in a Monty Pythonesque fashion at the thought of having to say to ones enemies, ‘please wait up old chap, I just need to purify myself. It won’t take too long,’ each time a fellow combatant is killed! I think Monty Python’s purification might involve a rooibos tea break!

However, contamination through contact with a corpse, by direct contact or proximity, was considered a severe pollution by our ancient ancestors, subject to karet - divine retribution - if not addressed and therefore requiring a complex process of re-purification.

Classical Judaism understands the term chukkah as a law that “defies rational explanation.” Anthropologists understand the process as a kind of, “sympathetic magic, the red-coloured ash mixture absorbs the corpse pollution.” There are also parallels in other Near Eastern literature. There are even those in Israel who are trying to breed an appropriate parah adomah just in case a third temple seems on the cards.

Although there might be some ancient essence or function to this ritual, the concept of slaughtering an animal for this purpose was thankfully excluded by Rabbinic Judaism. However, Rabbinic Law does develop the notion of shechita, the ritual slaughter of birds and mammals according to dietary laws that are Biblically inspired (Deut. 12:21, Deut. 14:21, Num. 11:22). Shechita is intended to provide meat that is ritually clean for human consumption but in a manner that shows respect and compassion to the animal. A plethora of halakhot define the skill of the shochet, the ritual slaughter so that animals are killed in the most humane way.

The practice of shechita has often been brought into question, usually by those concerned with animal rights although to my knowledge scientific research has not been conclusive. Much of the debate concerns whether it is more humane to pre-stun an animal. There is much outcry this week from the Jewish Community after the lower house of the Dutch Parliament voted to outlaw religious slaughter without pre-stunning.

This is not the first ban to be imposed. In Switzerland shechita has been forbidden since the late 1800s and it is also forbidden in New Zealand, Sweden, Finland, Norway, Iceland, Estonia, Latvia, and Croatia. The proposed ban in the Netherlands deserves more thought.

The legislation was tabled by the tiny Animal Rights Party but it quickly won cross-party support as many in the Netherlands believe that traditional religion, especially Islam, is inconsistent with liberal Dutch values. The country that once championed religious freedom seems to be leading the curtailment of those freedoms under rights legislation.

Both the Islamic dhabiha and Jewish shechita methods of ritual slaughter require the animals to be fully conscious. The only halakhic authority to allow pre-stunning before shechita was Yechiel Ya'akov Weinberg, who lived in Germany during the Nazi era. The Nazis passed a law that all animals should be stunned before slaughter, so he allowed it in his responsa (Seridei Esh 2:12) but only because of the difficulty of the situation. He is the only authority that allows it though, since others argue that stunning the animal renders it treifa, unhealthy and thus cannot be consumed.

The banning of shechita by the Nazis has been noted this week by a number of Rabbis, including the Chief Rabbi of the Netherlands and Jonathan Sacks. It is also true that under oppressive regimes, the banning of shechita has been one of the features of the curtailment of religious freedom.

This line of argumentation that is deeply emotive, alongside the feeling of attack on ritual freedoms, will see the Jewish Community fight long and hard against further restrictions of practice. Indeed, Shechita UK has been established in its words, “to promote awareness of and education about the Jewish religious humane method of dispatching animals for food, and to dispel the myths and falsehoods that have all too often been used as means to attack Jews and their religion.”

What might the approach of Liberal Judaism be?

At this time, there does seem to be a growing attack on religious freedoms that affect the Jewish and Muslim Communities. It comes mainly from the extreme left and right but is creeping into mainstream discourse. Interestingly, in the Netherlands, it was Christian ministers who fought against the ban. Efforts to ban brit milah, circumcision in San Francisco and Santa Monica are growing and whilst activists are at pains to deny motivations of anti-Semitism, their words and processes are not reassuring to Jews or Muslims. If anti-Semitism or Islamaphobia and the curtailment of valid religious freedoms are behind these moves, we must fight with the rest of the Jewish Community.

However, in that debate, we must be true to our principles of informed choice. The essence of the ritual is the most humane method of killing an animal, the intention to minimize the animal’s suffering. If there is conclusive, scientific evidence to show that shechita no longer provides the most humane approach, “then it should be superseded by the most humane. Liberal Jews should not cling to a ‘tradition’ whose basic intent no longer applies (Pete Tobias, Liberal Judaism – A Judaism for the 21st Century, 226).”  Our emphasis is on ‘ethical eating’ and might be “regarded as a modern variation on the themes implicit in the laws of kashrut (ibid.).”

We must not be naïve but remain vigilant against those who are motivated by anti-semitism, Islamaphobia or any other form of prejudice. We cannot deny that this is the real motivation for many activists and that the emphasis on those supporting shechita to provide scientific evidence of their case and not the other side, suggests a creep into the mainstream. Yet our arguments are all the more persuasive when they show a willingness to consider valid scientific evidence and the desire to maintain our ancient heritage as relevant and meaningful. Shechita is not the parah adomah but we must remain aware of the possibility that methods may one day supersede it.

In the difficult debates that will follow, Eternal One, give us the wisdom and strength to perceive the nuance of the arguments so that we might support the rights of all to practice Judaism freely and humanely.

Amen.