Do Arabs eat pork? Eating pork is prohibited in the Koran
Everyone knows that Muslims and Jews have a religious ban on eating pork. Why did Christians escape this fate?
However, both Jews and Arabs are primarily guided not so much by concern for their health as by the fulfillment of religious commandments. The pages of the Torah and Koran repeatedly touch upon the issues of proper nutrition, permitted and prohibited foods. Among the latter is pork. However, each religion has its own nuances.
One of the most important components of Islam is such concepts as “halal” (everything that is permitted by Allah) and “haram” (forbidden). They also apply to food. In the Koran (Sura 5, verse 3) it is written: “You are forbidden to [eat] carrion, blood, pork, as well as anything that is slaughtered without mentioning the name of Allah.”
As you know, pork is a heavy product, and from the point of view of Islam, excess nutrition is a sin. This is discussed in another verse: “Do not eat too much, but be moderate, so as not to harm yourself and not deprive the poor. Allah does not like wasteful people and is displeased with their immoderate actions! (Qur'an 6:141).
Muslims also prohibit products that have appeared on the market relatively recently and contain additives that include pork fat. Some manufacturers of cheese, chocolate, baked goods, carbonated drinks, soap and toothpastes are guilty of this. Modern Islamic scientists here are guided not only by religious commandments, but also by medicine, explaining that pork fat is poorly absorbed by the human body.
It is noteworthy that in Islam lamb can also be equated to pork (as a forbidden product) if it was not prepared according to halal canons. For example, a ram was killed in agony or before his death he saw another animal die.
The Torah, like the Koran, also contains an explicit prohibition against eating pork: “The Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying to them, “Say to the children of Israel, ‘These are the animals that you may eat of all the livestock on the earth: every animal that has two hoofs, and there is a deep cut in the hooves, and he who chews the cud, eat” (Leviticus 11:2-3).
Deer, cows, goats, and sheep have both of these signs—their meat is kosher. A pig, even despite the presence of a cloven hoof with a deep cut, is not a ruminant animal, and therefore forbidden for Jews - “clubs”. “But a pig, although it has two hooves, does not chew the cud, is unclean to you; You shall not eat their flesh, nor touch their carcasses” (Deuteronomy 14:8).
In addition, Judaism allows the consumption of poultry, but, like ruminant ungulates, it must be prepared accordingly. The animal is slaughtered with a special sharpened knife (to cause it as little suffering as possible), then all the blood is removed from the carcass. But even a properly slaughtered animal can become non-kosher if, for example, it is cooked with dairy products.
Why is there no ban on eating pork in Christianity, for which, like Judaism, one of the main books is the Old Testament? Moreover, for many Christians (for example, Russians or Germans) pork is one of their favorite meat dishes.
The answer to this question can be found in the New Testament books. Here, for example, are the words of the Apostle Paul: “Therefore the law was a guide to Christ for us, that we might be justified by faith; But when faith comes, we are no longer under a teacher” (Gal. 3:24,25).
In other words, the Old Testament fulfilled its role - it prepared the coming of the Messiah, and from now on, following some of its commandments is not an indispensable condition for entering the Kingdom of Heaven. But initially, God’s instructions about food did not contain any prohibitions. “Every moving thing that lives will be food for you” (Gen. 9:3).
Here is another passage from the Gospel that fully reveals Christ’s attitude to this issue, so sensitive in Judaism and Islam. “Food does not bring us closer to God: for whether we eat, we gain nothing; If we don’t eat, we don’t lose anything.”
Many people are interested in the question of why Muslims and Jews do not eat pork. It would seem an unpretentious animal that produces a lot of meat. We eat it and feel great. From many you can hear the standard answer: "Religion Forbids" or "A pig is a dirty animal". But if you remember the times of the birth of religions, people were not much cleaner than the same pigs.
But there is also a historical aspect of the prohibition of pork consumption by these religions. Editorial "So simple!" will tell you why can't you eat pig meat? Muslims and Jews.
Why don't Muslims eat pork?
Indeed, the prohibition against eating pig meat can be found in the Koran: “From what has been revealed to me, I find it prohibited to eat only carrion, shed blood and the meat of a pig, which (or which) is unclean, as well as the unlawful meat of animals slaughtered for other than the sake of Allah.”. But why this particular animal?
Therefore, eating pork caused many severe poisonings, illnesses and deaths. Naturally, people believed that these phenomena had a much deeper meaning than a threat to health. If the body does not accept this meat, then it is diabolical. Consequently, pork was prohibited.
Almost any prohibition in religion can be justified scientifically. For example, Jews have a ban on eating lobsters, crabs and crayfish. As is now known, the meat of these sea inhabitants contains the cadaveric poison ptomain. And kashrut laws prohibit eating the meat of predators, since they are carnivores, which means there are a lot of toxins in their bodies.
Also interesting is the fact that all Abrahamic religions prohibit eating pork. “But a pig, although it has two hooves, does not chew the cud, is unclean to you; Do not eat their meat and do not touch their corpses.”(Bible, Deuteronomy, chapter 14, verse 8). There are also legends that pigs are people transformed by God into animals. In any case, you need to honor your traditions and religion, because in this world not everything can be scientifically explained, which means there is something above us.
World-renowned professor Ilya Ivanov headed the experimental research station in the Askania-Nova nature reserve. In those days, you could see a lot of unusual things there: deer and oryx, zebroids, and some amazing bison grazed in one clearing. These semi-fairy-tale living creatures are the creations of Ilya Ivanov: in living nature, for a number of reasons, such interspecific crossings are impossible. Can you imagine the fruit of the “marriage” of a rat and a mouse? Professor Ivanov developed such a hybrid.
Ilya Ivanovich’s work in the field of physiology and biology of artificial insemination of higher animals was sensational for his time. “By artificial insemination, one can cause conception from a father who, by the time of insemination, not only has already died, but does not even exist in nature,” wrote Ivanov. Well, just like cloning!
This was all prelude. The learned man sought something different - to cross a man with a monkey. For what? How to answer the question: why did people come up with the mythical Centaur - half-man, half-horse?..
The owner of the Askania-Nova reserve, Baron F. Falz-Fein, although interested in the professor’s work, refused to finance the daring experiment of crossing humans and monkeys. At the beginning of the last century, it was not customary to doubt the divine origin of man, but to dare similar experiences- meant entering into conflict with the Holy Synod. Probably, Ivanov’s plan would never have been realized if the revolution had not happened in Russia.
The Bolsheviks who came to power were militant atheists and fought religion in every way. And here the scientist proposes to cross a monkey with a man and thus prove that man is not the work of the Creator. In 1924, Professor Ilya Ivanov sent a memorandum to the People's Commissar of Education A. Lunacharsky and the People's Commissar of Food A. Tsyurupa, in which he asked the government to promote experiments in crossing apes and humans “in the interests of Russian science and the promotion of a natural-historical worldview among the masses.” For these experiments, the scientist asks to allocate 15 thousand of the then dollars, much more valuable than the current ones. The government of the hungry, the poor, the bloodless civil war country finds money for an extravagant event.
Ilya Ivanov believed that experiments on crossing people with monkeys should be carried out in two directions: to fertilize a female gorilla with human seed, and a woman with the seed of a male gorilla. There was a problem: where to get monkeys? Ilya Ivanovich suggested moving the experiment to West Africa. The Chairman of the Foreign Procurement Commission of the People's Commissariat for Education, Novikov, accompanied Professor Ivanov's note with a positive conclusion based on the fact that “... that such an important materialist problem as the origin of man, and scientific-materialist (anti-religious) propaganda, which is inextricably linked with this experiment, should have been raised and developed in our Union." In 1926, Soviet newspapers notified readers about Professor Ivanov’s expedition to African jungle.
In Africa, Professor Ivanov heard many stories about the abduction of women great apes and the appearance of offspring. But these were unverified rumors. But cases of rape of native women by monkeys did occur, although rarely. Victims of violence often died in the powerful embrace of a male gorilla - their chest was crushed. With the help of the natives, thirteen chimpanzees were captured with great difficulty. On the way, two monkeys died.
In the Sukhumi nursery, the “new residents” were carefully looked after, but they died: dysentery, pneumonia, tuberculosis... An autopsy of two dead female monkeys showed that they never conceived. Moreover, during the expedition, African women refused to “love” male chimpanzees. For this purpose, more flexible pygmies from Gabon were prescribed. The result was zero, and the currency was melting. Obsessed with the idea, Ivanov did not give up: “It is necessary not only to increase the number of experiments on artificial insemination of female chimpanzees with human sperm, but also to conduct experiments on reciprocal (mutual. - Author's note) crossing. The latter is much more difficult and complex to organize in Africa than in Europe or here. Women willing to undergo the experience are incomparably easier to find in Europe than in Africa.” What Europe has to do with it is unknown. In those days, there was no problem in the domestic “human material”. Monkeys were in short supply. It seems that the scientist had no ethical doubts.
The resolution of the commission, convened on April 14, 1929 under the Scientific Department of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, read: “Joining the resolution of the physics and mathematics department of the All-Union Academy of Sciences dated September 30, 1925 regarding the large scientific significance experiments of interspecific hybridization on anthropoids conducted by Professor I. I. Ivanov, the commission believes that:
The experiments should be continued by Prof. Ivanov in the Sukhumi monkey nursery as between certain types monkeys, so between monkey and man.
Hybridization experiments by artificially inseminating women with anthropoid sperm can only be carried out with the woman’s written consent to undergo insemination with anthropoid sperm, to take the risk of the experiment and to submit to the isolation regime.
Experiments should be carried out as far as possible more women, in any case, at least five.”
More and more institutions took part in the project of crossing man with ape. It’s not hard to guess which office was responsible for the “isolation regime.” Researchers were unable to find the protocols of the Sukhumi experiments. However, there is enough direct and indirect evidence that they were carried out not only in the Sukhumi nature reserve, but also in the Gulag camps. The results of these top-secret experiments are still unknown.
February 4th, 2018
Everyone knows that Jews and Muslims do not eat pork, but few have wondered why they do it this way. Usually it all comes down to explanations that a pig is considered a dirty animal. But at the time when religions were born, the rest of the cattle were not much cleaner! And the people themselves often lived in terrible, unsanitary conditions.
What's the matter?
Kashrut or kosher is a set of strict dietary restrictions based on the laws of the Torah and Talmud. Kosher allows you to eat meat only from animals that are both artiodactyls and ruminants - from sheep to giraffes.
However, the kosher prohibits eating pork and hare, because pigs do not chew cud, and hares do not have hooves. There was also an explanation for the behavior of “semi-kosher” animals: in a dream, pigs supposedly proudly expose their “correct” hooves, but hide their muzzles, and hares, on the contrary, tuck their paws out of shame.
The meat of kosher animals must be prepared by a professional butcher, a shochet, who slaughters the cattle in one special movement, never piercing the meat or delaying the movement of the knife. Shokhets undergo long training before taking up their duties.
There are a lot of laws for cutting meat in the Jewish tradition: it is important not only the participation of the shochet in the slaughter of livestock, but also the checking of the animal for diseases, which is performed by the mashgiach, and the cleaning of the carcass by the menaker from fat and veins, which are prohibited by kosher. The consumption of seafood is also strictly regulated: they must have scales and fins, that is, eating mollusks and crustaceans is strictly prohibited.
Every housewife is required to sift flour to prevent worms from getting into it and carefully inspect fruits and vegetables for larvae. The prohibition against eating insects gives only one exception: you can eat locusts (Lev. 11:22).
Kosher also prohibits eating foods containing blood (therefore, when cutting meat, they sprinkle it with salt, which absorbs it), bird eggs with identical, blunt or sharp ends (as a rule, eggs of birds of prey have identical ends), and alcohol, which is not made religious Jews, subject to many special rules. It is strictly forbidden to “cook a kid in mother’s milk” or mix milk with meat at one meal. However, it is hardly possible to check the kosher of already prepared food using formal methods, and therefore this right is usually given to the rabbi.
In addition, other peoples are tolerant of pigs, although these animals all over the world equally love to roll in the mud. So what's the catch then?
It turned out that even scientists were interested in this ban. They say that every food taboo in religion is easily explained in terms of common sense. This is not some whim of religious fanatics, but real precautions!
As an unclean animal, the pig is mentioned already in the Torah (9th century BC). The Jews' aversion to the pig was so strong that instead of the word "pig" they often said "davar acher", literally - "another thing", that is, something that it is better not even to call by its name.
The negative attitude of Jews and Muslims towards pigs is explained by the uncleanliness of these animals, which even eat their own excrement, and by the fact that in hot climates their meat quickly accumulates cadaveric poison. However, Jewish teachers of the law invariably emphasized that one should not look for any rational reasons here; the Lord’s motivation is hidden from man.
Ethnographers believe that the whole point is in the peculiarities of primitive beliefs, from which many taboos migrated to later formed religions. In animal-deifying totemism, one of the earliest religious systems, it is forbidden to pronounce the name or touch those of them that are considered the gods of the tribe.
Probably, among the Semitic peoples the boar was once such a god. The cult of bestiality was supplanted by the cults of anthropomorphic gods, but ritual taboos “by inertia” continued to operate. For example, our ancestors could not call the bear by its real name - ber, and this is how this “honey-witch”, that is, “honey connoisseur,” took root. By the way, the Slavs once also had a ban on eating bear meat.
It is worth saying that the Old Testament also says that you cannot eat pig meat, but how many Christians adhere to this prohibition?
The gastronomic preferences of Muslims are very limited. All food in Islam is divided into three groups: halal, makruh and haram, which correlate with Indian sattva, rajas and tamas, and of these, only halal is completely permitted for consumption.
The Koran, like the Torah, is primarily a set of laws that determines the life of Muslims. The Qur'an prohibits the consumption of pork, carrion, improperly slaughtered livestock (without mentioning the name of Allah) and blood (5:3). However, violation of the prohibition, as is often specifically indicated in the Koran, is possible in extreme cases: “If someone, suffering from hunger, and not from a tendency to sin, is forced to eat what is forbidden, then Allah is forgiving and merciful.”
In addition, Islam prohibits killing animals without a reason, and some Muslim theologians believe that the profession of slaughtering livestock is sinful. Halal rules are less strict than kosher laws: Muslims do not have a special person who slaughters livestock, and the slaughter rules themselves are also slightly different from Jewish ones. On the other hand, Islam prohibits kosher-legal alcoholic beverages.
For Christianity, the taboo of food is less common and strict, but the sacralization of food is also typical. It is forbidden to eat something “sacrificed to idols,” that is, sacrificed by the pagans to the gods, foul eating, as well as - during fasting - meat, milk, eggs, butter, fish and some other products.
The absence of significant food taboos is due to the fact that New Testament abolished those prohibitions that were prescribed in the Old Testament and coincided with the already listed Jewish laws. According to the teachings of Christ, food cannot defile spiritual person: “Eat everything that is sold at the market without any examination, for peace of conscience; for the earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness of it” (1 Cor. 10:25-27).
Hinduism is characterized by a refusal to eat beef, due to the fact that the cow is a sacred animal. Many followers of this religion adhere to ahimsa - a teaching that preaches non-violence, and, accordingly, a special vegetarian diet.
Followers of Jainism, another Indian religion, even wear special bandages over their mouths and sweep the road in front of them with a broom so as not to accidentally kill living beings. Needless to say, they do not eat them in any form. Hindus try not to eat rajasic foods - those that have too pronounced taste qualities, such as coffee or tea, and tamasic foods - “tasteless, stinking, stale”, such as meat, garlic or eggs.
The origins of kosher may lie in moral commandments. When cattle are slaughtered correctly, the animal dies almost painlessly. The taboo on eating blood may also be due to considerations of humanity and reluctance to shed blood as a symbol of the soul of God's creatures. The ban on eating birds of prey and their eggs is associated with the fear that the aggressiveness of predators will be transmitted to people. The Torah even says that before the great flood all people were vegetarians, but after that the Lord gave them animals to eat.
Also interesting is the possible interpretation of the ban on mixing milk and meat, which subsequently evolved into a taboo on eating them at one meal: meat, as a symbol of death and murder, should not be mixed with symbolic new life, that is, mother's milk, which promotes the growth of the young. It is possible that this taboo also reflected early religious ideas about the ban on boiling milk, since in them milk had a magical connection with its source, that is, it was part of the whole - a cow or goat. Accordingly, boiling milk was likened to boiling it in the udder, which was supposed to harm the animal and deprive people of milk yield.
In addition, many African tribes still have prohibitions on any mixing of milk and meat, including in the human stomach, which can be explained by fear for the health of the cow - after all, one of its dead parts, meat, is mixed with the living part, milk, and the cow symbolically eats itself, as a result of which its milk is polluted. It is likely that the ban on mixing milk and meat reflected the alienation of two types of crops - agricultural and cattle breeding, which competed with each other.
The ban on eating pork in Islam and Judaism was most likely a preventive sanitary and hygienic measure, since pork quickly deteriorates in conditions ancient world devoid of refrigerators and modern medicine, could become a deadly dish. In addition, the pig, with its promiscuous sexual and food preferences and obvious love of dirt, generated symbolic identification with dirty, slovenly and sexually promiscuous people. Accordingly, eating its meat could promise a person’s acquisition of all of the above qualities. Sometimes a negative attitude towards pigs gave rise to funny cases: In the 18th century, some rabbis considered the tomato to be a pork fruit and forbade its consumption.
And the Indian ban on eating beef may be closely related to economic reasons: in India, cow dung was used for construction and heating purposes, they were used as draft animals and produced milk, which made them more valuable than any other animal. So the image of the nursing cow began to be sacralized, and in the 4th century AD. the ban on killing cows and bulls became official law.
The ban on bread and wine prepared by non-Jews refers to the desire of the Jews to consolidate fellow believers and prevent the assimilation of other peoples. Accordingly, at any festival organized by representatives of other religions, it will be very difficult for a Jew to keep kosher. IN modern cultures similar socially determined reasons for the prohibition of food in Judaism or Islam play vital role for religious unity.
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Religion plays a certain role in the life of every person. There are always those who believe. And those who prove the absence of anything otherworldly. Each religion has its own laws, rules, legends. People choose for themselves what to believe, who to believe in. There are several world religions, the largest, they have the most followers:
- Christianity;
- Islam;
- Buddhism.
Each religion has its own varieties and movements. But the goal and meaning are the same - faith in God. Christianity has a doctrine set forth in the holy book - the Bible. Symbols: Orthodox and Catholic cross. The differences are not particularly noticeable, but the Catholics separated from the Orthodox, and this is noticeable.
Islam is another word for Islam; in terms of the number of followers it is not far from Christianity. The holy book is the Koran. Muslims call their god Allah. For Muslims, everything is quite strict; before every meal, leaving the house, before going to bed, and many other things, Muslims pray. Every year you need to send money to the poor, fast for a month, this greatly strengthens your spirit and endurance.
There is no church in Islam. One of the signs of Muslims is the fact that they do not eat pork. Why don't Muslims eat pork? History says that pig is a dirty animal. There are a lot of things written in the Koran about pork; eating it is prohibited. The Bible also speaks negatively about pork, but Christians do not adhere to such strict rules. How can God punish us for what we eat?
Muslims must believe in the words of their god. If the prophet said that he forbids eating pork, then it is so. Don't wonder why. If a person understands that this is true, that is very good. We must respect the laws of the Gods.
There are also logical reasons why you should not eat pork. If you look at it from a scientific point of view, you can get many diseases because pigs eat everything that is thrown at them. And they are known to be constantly in the mud. You can easily become infected with helminths - worms; they begin to grow in the intestines and reach enormous lengths. If they get into the brain, they lead to memory loss; if they get into the heart, they lead to a heart attack; if they get into the eyes, they can lead to blindness. Worms may not crawl to organs on their own; eggs, poisons and bacteria can travel through the blood.
Pork fat has a bad effect on your figure and causes obesity. Meat is filled with fat and cholesterol, which clogs blood vessels and causes terrible heart disease.
It seems to me that you should try to protect yourself as much as possible from these diseases and really stop eating pork. Pigs are very dirty animals, even if you keep the pigsty clean. Pigs eat excrement, both their own and that of others, which sounds disgusting. Many people will say that you don't only get worms from pigs. But in the time of the Prophet Muhammad, who knew what other animals carried this disease?
Even scientists have proven that the stories of the Bible and the Koran are not just myths, but real warnings. By listening to God's laws, perhaps we can live sanely and calmly. Pork spoils very quickly; if you delay cooking, you can get intestinal infections or become seriously poisoned. Microorganisms grow quickly in meat. In many religions, a pig is considered an unclean animal; cadaveric poison quickly forms in the meat. The harm from such meat is colossal.
Carnivorous predators who eat carrion were also considered unclean, since corpse meat rots in their stomachs. Not a very pleasant topic, but to be careful, you need to know everything.
You shouldn’t be categorical about God’s laws, but you shouldn’t ignore them either. Perhaps the wisdom of the gods saved quite a few lives, and thanks to it we were born. We need to treat all religions adequately; we shouldn’t insult or offend anyone. We will never know what is true and what is not. Be tolerant and tolerant of others.
