The Jewish Value of Tza’ar Ba’alei Chayim
What is Tza’ar Ba’alei Chayim?
A foundational Jewish value is having compassion for animals. This principle, known as tza’ar ba’alei chayim (literally “the suffering of living beings”), teaches the importance of preventing unnecessary animal suffering. The origins of tza’ar ba’alei chayim come from the Torah and it has continued to be of significant moral concern throughout Jewish history. As concerns about animal well-being have shifted in our modern world, what responsibilities do we have to protect animals as individuals and as a community?
How to Treat Animals According to Jewish Ethics
Rabbinic tradition derives the concept of tza’ar ba’alei chayim from the Torah. Talmudic sages debated the authoritative nature of tza’ar ba’alei chayim, using the example of a donkey suffering “under its burden” in Exodus 23:5 and Deuteronomy 22:4. Ultimately the requirement to prevent animal suffering was decided to be a matter of Torah law (Babylonian Talmud, Bava Metzia 32:b). This distinction matters because Torah commandments take precedence over rabbinic ones, emphasizing the moral weight of our responsibility as humans to prevent animal suffering.
Throughout history, Rabbinic scholars have understood tza’ar ba’alei chayim to include both positive and negative obligations toward animals. These range from the prohibition against working animals without breaks (Arukh ha-Shulhan, Hoshen Mishpat 307:13), to the obligation to feed the animals in your care before feeding yourself (Babylonian Talmud, Brachot 40a). Overall, the traditional interpretation of tza’ar ba’alei chayim allows the use of animals for human needs so long as we treat them compassionately. However, it does not permit humans to do with animals whatever they wish.
Animal Suffering and Kosher Slaughter
One of the deeply considered applications of tza’ar ba’alei chayim is the act of killing and eating animals. Several great thinkers, including the medieval philosopher Rambam (Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, or Maimonides) connected tza’ar ba’alei chayim to the laws of shechita (kosher slaughter). In this interpretation, shechita is a measure that embodies tza’ar ba’alei chayim by facilitating as quick and painless a death as possible for animals. While shechita may have been a more humane method of slaughter at one point in history, it looks quite different in our current time.
In our modern food system, kosher slaughter is conducted in ways that challenge the interpretations of Jewish philosophers. The practice of kosher slaughter now takes place in high-speed, industrialized facilities prioritizing speed and volume over everything else, including the well-being of animals. More than 99% of farmed animals, including those that supply the kosher market in the United States, are raised on factory farms where they experience consistent, abject suffering. While the traditional interpretation of tza’ar ba’alei chayim focused on how animals were killed, perhaps the contemporary interpretation should include attention to how farmed animals are raised.
Animal Welfare Today
Present-day American Jewish communities, like Americans in general, are increasingly concerned with animal welfare. The study of animal behavior and cognition demonstrates that animals are sentient beings capable of experiencing complex emotions like pain, joy, loneliness, and compassion. Modern animal scientists express similar sentiments to Rambam, who mused on the emotional lives of goats and wild birds writing, “There is no difference in this case between the pain of man and the pain of other living beings” (Guide for the Perplexed 3:48). Knowing that animals feel both physical distress and complex emotions obliges us to reconsider what constitutes human need in the face of preventable animal suffering.
These modern insights challenge us to reflect on how our actions have fallen out of line with tza’ar ba’alei chayim, one of our core Jewish values. While treating our companion animals with kindness is important, the scale of suffering among farmed animals demands urgent attention. One of the most direct ways to prevent animal suffering is by reducing your reliance on animal products produced on industrial farms. Instead, incorporate more plant-based foods whenever possible and be an advocate for sustainable and ethical food practices. To align your community’s dining programs with Jewish values, start by creating a food policy for your synagogue, summer camp, Hillel, or school cafeteria that makes compassion for animals a priority.
Today, tza’ar ba’alei chayim is more than a theoretical principle; it is a call to action. By making compassionate choices in our daily lives and communal practices, we honor this essential Jewish value and contribute to a kinder and more sustainable world for all living beings.
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