Why don’t Jews eat pork?
Judaism in Five Minutes - Sarah Imhoff
Jordan D. Rosenblum [+]
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Jordan D. Rosenblum is the Belzer Professor of Classical Judaism at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is the author of four books, most recently Forbidden: A 3,000-Year History of Jews<.i> and the Pig and Rabbinic Drinking: What Beverages Teach Us About Rabbinic Literature. He has also co-edited four books, including Feasting and Fasting: The History and Ethics of Jewish Food and Animals and the Law in Antiquity.
Description
While the Hebrew Bible prohibits eating pig, it also prohibits several other animals, such as the camel. In the Second Temple period, the pig begins to step out into center stage. Moving through history from antiquity to the present day, both Jews and non-Jews invest the pig with more meaning, especially in regard to Jewish and non-Jewish identity. Throughout history we discover that the pig has a complicated history and some Jews choose to eat—or not eat—the pig for various reasons, all of which inform, and are informed by, their notions of Jewish identity.