Dear friend,

What follows is a takkana, a reparative Jewish practice, declaring red meat treif (non-kosher) on weekdays for the duration of the present ecological crisis due to its impact on our biosphere. I’d be honored if you’d consider signing on and adopting this practice.

Nobody will be forced to accept this practice. Folks are invited to accept this practice, deciding whether they want to lend their personal power to this sacred commitment. Spiritual leaders who sign on to this practice do so not as enforcers, but as role models.

This practice is open to folks who are Jewish, Jew-ish, and not Jewish. It is rooted in faith, and informed by a commitment to increased liberation for all.

If you’re interested in a project of a different kind or with different parameters, I’d be delighted if you’d create a parallel project. It would be wonderful if there were a wave of multiple interventions on the issue framed for different communities.

Warmly,

Jericho Vincent

Spiritual Leader, Temple of the Stranger
Board Member, The Shalom Center
Participant, Wexner Summit on Climate Change

 

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Takkanat Basar: Accepting Red Meat as Non-Kosher on Weekdays

We are poised in a promising but fraught moment, birthing a new era in which humans will live in right relationship with the natural world we belong to. There are inevitably challenges in this moment and there is inevitably pain. Jewish sacred texts tell us that we can reduce suffering in this birthing process with focus and with right action, as it says: “How shall a person be spared from the pains of birthing a liberatory era? Busy yourself with wisdom and righteous deeds.” (Sanhedrin 98b)

In this birthing process, daily consumption of red meat is not possible. In fact, it’s self-sabotaging. Roughly one-seventh of all human-caused greenhouse gas emissions are attributable to livestock farming. Livestock takes up nearly 80% of global agricultural land, yet produces less than 20% of the world’s supply of calories. While some choose to eliminate animal flesh or products from their diets entirely, one recent study showed that if every American only reduced their meat consumption by 25%, substituting in plant proteins, we’d reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by around 82 million metric tons per year, and also see enormous increases in biodiversity, savings of massive quantities of water, and a reduction in deforestation.

In this perilous moment, we invite you to participate in Takkanat Baasar, or “A Reparative Practice Regarding Red Meat.”

Participating in the Takkanat Baasar means making the decision to accept the following statements:

--We are but guests on this planet, as it says: “The earth is Mine, you are but strangers residing with Me.” (Lev 25:23)

--It is our responsibility to be responsible guests on this planet, as it says in our sacred texts: “Be mindful that you do not ruin and devastate My world, for if you ruin it there is no one to repair it after you.” (KRabbah 7:13)

--We affirm our ancestors’ insistence that we be in right relationship to the natural world we belong to.

--On the authority of these imperatives, we issue a takkana, a new spiritual directive in response to an immediate concern:

--Red meat is treif, or non-kosher, on chol— days that are not Shabbat or holidays (or equivalent celebrations).

--Something that is treif or non-kosher is deleterious to the human spirit. It violates both the values of our ancestors and the imperative of the Divine within, around, and beyond us.

--Abstaining from red meat on chol— days that are not Shabbat or holidays— is a mitzvah, a sacred imperative.

This takkana is inspired by prior ancestral spiritual leaders who, long before our current circumstances, abstained from eating red meat on chol, and it is inspired by the sages of Integral Halacha and pioneers of eco-Kashrut. Our tradition offers a number of imperatives for intentional eating, and for many, this takkana will be only a small part of a larger and more exacting religious or ethical practice that weighs the environmental and spiritual impact of many food choices. Eating red meat on Shabbat and holidays is exempted from this takkana because of ancestral traditions of eating red meat specifically at these times, but some might have a more expansive practice that precludes or minimizes red meat even then.

Of course, the principles of preserving life and honoring and respecting a person’s pressing individual needs are paramount. This directive is not relevant to those medically required to transgress it due to health concerns. If one’s body needs red meat on chol, it is a sacred duty to preserve one’s health and eat as needed.

This takkana is in effect for this period of transformation. It will lapse when we’ve birthed an era in which we are in right relationship with the natural world of which we are part, at which point the spiritual authorities of our time will reevaluate appropriate directives.

With eyes set on the liberatory era we are birthing,

Signed:

Martha Ackelsberg, professor emerita, Smith College
Rabbi Aura Ahuvia
Rabbinic Pastor Matia Rania Angelou, Makom Hazon
Rabbi Caryn Aviv
Rabbi Phyllis Ocean Berman
Rabbi Eli Cohen
Rabbi Juliet Elkind-Cruz
Rabbi Fred Scherlinder Dobb
Rabbi Sue Levi Elwell, PhD
Rabbi Debra Kolodny
Erev Rabbi Paige Lincenberg
Rabbi Reuben Modek
Rabbi Jay Moses
Rabbi David Osachy
Rabbi G. Rayzel Raphael
Aaron Rotenberg
Rabbi Jan Salzman
Rabbi SaraLeya Schley
Rabbi Lori Shaller
HaRav Dayan Daniel Siegel
Rabbi Eugene Fleischman Sotirescu
Jericho Vincent, Spiritual Leader, Temple of the Stranger
Rabbi Arthur Ocean Waskow
Adam Weisberg, Executive Director, Urban Adamah
Rabbi Raysh Weiss, PhD
Rabbi Dave Yedid
Rabbi Rain Zohav
 

 

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FAQ:

Many folks believe eating any amount of red meat is not okay at the moment, for all kinds of reasons. Why not declare red meat treif altogether? 

There are strong arguments to be made that at this moment we should not be eating red meat at all, but within the system of Jewish practice there is a principle called “heicha d’efshar efshar,” which means we don’t establish a practice if the general public would find it extremely onerous or near impossible to sustain that practice. Individuals and communities of dedicated folks can accept more stringent practices at their own discretion. The vast majority of Americans eat red meat regularly. Asking them to stop eating red meat on chol feels like a tall order, but a possible one. Given where the needle is now, asking them to abstain from red meat altogether feels like a practice too difficult to be palatable. 

Let us not allow the perfect to be the enemy of the good. 

Let us walk the path to liberation one step at a time.  

 

Is it appropriate to use the category of treif to describe this type of food in this circumstance? Why these terms, kosher and treif? 

 

Treif and kosher are ideal terms for this work because they are powerful terms, deeply rooted in the Jewish collective consciousness, even amongst Jews who have been alienated from mainstream religious Judaism.

The word kosher literally means fit or appropriate– a meaning which resonates precisely with our paradigm. In addition, the earliest usages of the word kosher in our sacred texts make it clear that it is a word that can apply in diverse circumstances, as per the concept of a kosher sukkah (Mishnah Sukkah 1 and elsewhere), kosher tefillin, (Menachot 29b and elsewhere), kosher shofar (Mishnah Rosh Hashana 3 and elsewhere) etc. The word treif comes from the Talmudic word treifus, which means ripped or torn, but it has long been in usage with broader applications, as when we deem a pot or an oven treif.

As to whether it is proper to apply these terms to refer to food rendered unfit or treif due to external circumstances as opposed to some inherent condition, we have precedent for this kind of application. In a number of sacred texts including the Mishnah Torah (8:11) we are taught that meat of unknown provenance found in the marketplace is kosher or treif depending on the proportion of kosher to non-kosher food shops in the surrounding marketplace. 

And as to whether we, in our time, have the authority to issue a ruling that a new thing or items in a new condition are kosher or treif, rabbis within the ultra-Orthodox community have been requiring their community members to use a “kosher” internet filter for years. That is an application of the word kosher with more stretch than ours– smartphones and laptops not being edible. If those rabbis have the spiritual chutzpah to issue a ruling like this, do we not have the spiritual chutzpah to use the tradition that is our inheritance with the same confidence– let alone in a circumstance where lives are at stake?