Animal sacrifice; when is it okay?

[Maponos]

As long as the animal isn't made to suffer and is treated honorably as a sacrifice.

 

[godnotgod]

As usual you are an expert on everybody else's religion and with so little effort, too.

It takes no expert and little effort to see the simple truth of the matter. Why, so simple, even a caveman can do it...ha...ha...

I refuse to be hypnotized by White Magic and Mumbo Jumbo. You?

Oh, I know: there is some Mumbo Jumbo that is Authentic and Authoritative Mumbo Jumbo, right? Why, it sez so right here in this here book....

If you can demonstrate exactly how blood sacrifice of any kind washes away sin, guilt, and shame, or how it is payment for anything in the eyes of a God, then by all means, please proceed.

 

[Akivah]

I've also heard people say it's not okay at all because animals don't deserve to die.

That doesn't make sense. Everything that lives eventually dies.

How do you feel about animal sacrifice? What are your arguments?

G-d setup a system of atonement for us humans. One of the possible atonements is a sacrifice. The sacrifice must be something of value to the person. Valid sacrifices were money, perfume, grain, or animals. Sacrifices could only atone for one category of sin, they were useless to atone for other categories. Since sacrifices could only be made at the Temple, the entire sacrificial system has been on hold for the past 2000 years as we are awaiting the future messiah to rebuild the Temple.

Also, I forgot to mention before; supposedly some people claim there is a "right way" to kill for sacrifice (minimal suffering). Why would suffering be important to the ritual? How does suffering of a lack thereof change anything?

Within the same bible that outlines the sacrificial system, there are also laws that deal with animals. One of those laws is that we are not to inflict unnecessary pain. So we have ritual butchers that are trained to administer a quick slash that instantaneously kills the animal. If this ritual slaughter is not done on an animals sacrifice, then in the process of atoning for one sin, another is committed.

 

[Nakosis]

I've heard various arguments about this. Many practitioners of African-American religions make use of this. Scriptures from traditional religions seem to approve or appropriate it to the point where new religious movements have used such content to discredit them.

I've heard people say this was okay only if you plan to eat the animal and put the inedible parts to use somehow. I think I can agree with this veiw because destruction should be for beneficial, creative or recreational purposes. Never just for destruction's sake.

If an animal is to die, it must have a purpose. It's only respectful. I feel the same about human deaths. I'm likely to be an organ donor or a donor to science after my death. In fact I would want that to happen if entirely possible.

I've also heard people say it's not okay at all because animals don't deserve to die. I would agree with this except carnivores kill innocent critters all the time. If animals don't deserve death, why is it they kill on their own terms? What makes us better than the other animals?

We somehow think we live in a world of glory when animals are treated like objects in factory settings and the road to death is simply the road of suffering. Animals are just as likely to die from exhaustion and disease in a factory as they are from actual slaughter. And we are better than the starving dwindling wolves whose powerful maws make quick work of an elder rabbit that probably would have become irreversibly sick in the following week? Should the animals resort to plant diets like many humans have consciously decided to partake in?

How do you feel about animal sacrifice? What are your arguments?

Also, I forgot to mention before; supposedly some people claim there is a "right way" to kill for sacrifice (minimal suffering). Why would suffering be important to the ritual? How does suffering of a lack thereof change anything?

Never, but that's personal opinion. Folks can act within whatever capacity the law allows.

 

[Tumah]

Can you explain the burning a little bit more? Why is it important to burn at least part of the animal after a sacrifice?

It wouldn't be a sacrifice if no part of it was actually brought on the altar.

 

[Akivah]

I think animal sacrifice in the old testament was nothing more than a way for lazy priests to get a free meal. God is spirit and therefore would not need physical sustenance. It was a scam.

Your thoughts are not in accordance with the Tanakh. Unlike every other Hebrew tribe, the priests were not given a portion of the land. Their only means of sustenance were from the sacrifices of money, grain, and animals.

 

[godnotgod]

That doesn't make sense. Everything that lives eventually dies.

That's not what Sabah said: Sabah said 'deserves to die'. And your rationale that just because everything eventually dies is no justification for killing, ESPECIALLY in the name of God.

G-d setup a system of atonement for us humans. One of the possible atonements is a sacrifice. The sacrifice must be something of value to the person. Valid sacrifices were money, perfume, grain, or animals. Sacrifices could only atone for one category of sin, they were useless to atone for other categories. Since sacrifices could only be made at the Temple, the entire sacrificial system has been on hold for the past 2000 years as we are awaiting the future messiah to rebuild the Temple.



Within the same bible that outlines the sacrificial system, there are also laws that deal with animals. One of those laws is that we are not to inflict unnecessary pain. So we have ritual butchers that are trained to administer a quick slash that instantaneously kills the animal. If this ritual slaughter is not done on an animals sacrifice, then in the process of atoning for one sin, another is committed.

The rest is pure fabricated belief, and has nothing to do with fact.

 

[Tumah]

It's an argument: show me how animal sacrifice is in any way efficacious for anything. It is completely based upon belief, and has no logic whatsoever, except a kind of twisted logic, as any valid basis. The opinion is that animal sacrifice actually does something. It does nothing except to cause suffering and death to the animal, and feed the ego of the believer.

This argument doesn't work unless you start from the point that the religion is not true. If its true, that its internal logic is consistent with itself.

In the case of sin, the Jewish sacrificial system is one of transference of guilt and shame onto the animal, the animal being the scapegoat. Same psychology as my example.

No, its not. That's what I explained in the following paragraph. You can't transfer your guilt, that's a Christian concept where Jesus takes everyone's guilt. Its not a Jewish idea. This was proven in my previous response in two ways:

1. The sacrificial system of atonement only works for a (very) limited number of cases. If transference of guilt was the point here, it should be possible for all sins.
2. Repentance is a pre-requisite for bringing a sacrifice. With repentance, one has already been absolved a guilt. What's left is atonement. Its like paying a fine.

One need not kill defenseless innocent animals to rectify one's mistake. Buddhists don't practice animal sacrifice, and find a way to face and overcome their transgressions and to correct their causes once and for all. Why can't you? Let's face it: The Jewish system of animal sacrifice has to do with the pagan, idolatrous, and superstitious BELIEF that the blood is the life-force. It's just an assumption, that's all, and has nothing to do with reality.

That's because we have a different belief than Buddhists in what needs to be rectified. What you are describing that Buddhists do, is part of repentance, not atonement.

Its definitely not about blood being the life force, because there is no such word or concept in Judaism.

Yes, you might like to examine this principle a bit closer, and take responsibility for your transgressions, instead of slaughtering poor animals in the name of your God.

As I pointed out earlier, only someone who intends to take responsibility for his actions would be bringing this sacrifice in the first place. There's no such thing as a poor animal anymore than there is of a poor carrot. Its my possession to be used in service of G-d.

FYI, when the teachings of Yeshua are stripped of the overlay of Mithra's pagan doctrines, we find no doctrine of blood sacrifice, no virgin birth, and no bodily resurrection. Yeshua was a Nazarene, a sect of the Essenes, which had ties to the Buddhist community from the Far East via the Essene sects in Greece and Egypt known as the Therapeutae, monks which emerged from the Theravada Buddhiststs which King Asoka sent out to the West. Yeshua's original teachings were breath-based, not blood-based.

I couldn't possibly care less.

 

[Akivah]

That's not what Sabah said: Sabah said 'deserves to die'.

It's a difference without a difference.

And your rationale that just because everything eventually dies is no justification for killing, ESPECIALLY in the name of God.

All organic life has to 'kill' other organics to survive. Whether it's an animal or a plant, something has to die for you to live.

 

[godnotgod]

It's a difference without a difference.


All organic life has to 'kill' other organics to survive. Whether it's an animal or a plant, something has to die for you to live.

True, but that is not ritual sacrifice for the purpose of atonement or repentance, and does not give you the right to kill for those reasons, especially when those reasons have no bearing in fact, but are purely based upon belief.

Most animal life will do everything in its power to escape natural predators, evidence that survival and life are powerful forces within them. They don't want to die by any means.

 

[The Kilted Heathen]

I'm interested in knowing why some people supposedly think life should suffer in the name of their god(s).

I wanted to go back and address this, since I saw it after my post, as well as add more to what I already posted. Animal sacrifice isn't about cruelty or suffering. Even when you see video where a pig is butchered and it's writhing and flailing around - PETA wants people to think the animal's suffering and the butcher's pitching a tent over it, but the fact of the matter is that the animal can't feel a thing and at that point is braindead. The body is convulsing involuntarily.

So far as eating the meat goes, I don't see any reason not to, and there's some belief that surrounds getting an answer (divination) through the meal. If the meat is sour or bad, then the purpose for your sacrifice will yield negative results. The pelts of animals hunted and sacrificed are believed to take on certain qualities, their bones can act as powerful rune charms, etc etc. It's not at all an act of just slaughtering something and leaving it to rot or burn. At least in Heathenry.

It should also be noted that in Heathenry, animal sacrifice isn't the only kind of sacrifice; it's actually fairly rare unless you're a hunter or animal farmer. More commonly we sacrifice portions of our crops, our meals (left in ceremonial bowls called a hlautbowl or "offering bowl"), or even artwork.

Actual farm chickens at least have the luxury of full life before they become dinner. But they're not the ones Chicken McNuggets are made from.

Even chickens in stores that say "free range" aren't that kind of chicken, and their truth is pretty dark. To be "free range," the chicken must be given the opportunity to range free for 1 hour a day. The other 23 hours they're packed into mass-coops that are often unsanitary. And for that one hour of opportunity, some farms offer that opportunity at night when the chickens are asleep. All that matters is that they have the opportunity, not that they can't take it.

 

[The Kilted Heathen]

Most animal life will do everything in its power to escape natural predators, evidence that survival and life are powerful forces within them.

Which, in a way, makes taking a life all the more meaningful and powerful to those who fully understand it.

 

[Aupmanyav]

Never. If one wants a non-vegetarian meal, that is OK. Why bring a non-existent entity in the picture?

 

[godnotgod]

Never. If one wants a non-vegetarian meal, that is OK. Why bring a non-existent entity in the picture?

Ignorance and superstition in the name of God runs rampant.

 

[The Kilted Heathen]

Try to take my life for your blood sacrifice ritual and watch what happens.

Oh settle down and get over yourself. No one said anything about human sacrifice, and when I do anything with blood it is my own. I was expecting some manner of angry, judgmental response from you, but this level of off-handed chest-puffing just shows that you know nothing of what you're criticizing here. You'd do well to learn a bit.

 

[Valjean]

As long as the animal isn't made to suffer and is treated honorably as a sacrifice.

So you think the animal is more concerned with comfort and his legacy than actual survival?

 

[Vee]

How do you feel about animal sacrifice? What are your arguments?

In the bible we find mentions of animal sacrifices in the old testament but then Jesus gave his own perfect life as the ultimate sacrifice and no more animal sacrifices were be done after that. Sacrificing animals is therefore unnecessary and even inappropriate for Christians.
Personally I despise the idea of killing animals for rituals. Animals might be intellectually inferior to humans but they are alive and deserve respect. We should look after them and when it is strictly necessary to kill one - to eat, for example - that should be done as quickly and painlessly as possible. Every living thing deserves dignity.
At the same time, I mean no disrespect to people's traditions, but I don't see the interest to sacrifice an animal to God. What is he going to do with it?

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

I think animal sacrifice in the old testament was nothing more than a way for lazy priests to get a free meal. God is spirit and therefore would not need physical sustenance. It was a scam.

It was a foreshadowing of Christ. It was also a progression in humanity's religious sense. We went from sacrificing humans and animals, to animals only and then God put an end to it by offering Himself as Sacrifice for all time. He always meets us where we are and then moves us forward in His plan when He determines we're ready. I doubt God ever really cared about the animal sacrifices, and basically says so in Hosea 6:6. They were a sign of repentence than anything else. It's not like He needed them or anything.

 

[Akivah]

True, but that is not ritual sacrifice for the purpose of atonement or repentance, and does not give you the right to kill for those reasons, especially when those reasons have no bearing in fact, but are purely based upon belief.

Your belief isn't determinative as to the appropriate reasons to kill animals.

 

[godnotgod]

Oh settle down and get over yourself. No one said anything about human sacrifice, and when I do anything with blood it is my own. I was expecting some manner of angry, judgmental response from you, but this level of off-handed chest-puffing just shows that you know nothing of what you're criticizing here. You'd do well to learn a bit.

Who is it that needs to get over themselves? You are so smug about killing animal life, as if there is a proper way to do it. If an animal could speak, they would be just as vocal as a human in its desire to save its own life.

What is there to learn? You act as if you have some special knowledge that makes animal sacrifice 'OK'. But even if it were 'OK', show me exactly how it does what it is supposed to do. That people think it does, is pure belief, and has no basis in fact. It is, in fact, a set of beliefs based upon fear, ignorance, and superstition propped up with ritual and mumbo jumbo sanctioned by some God.

So don't give me that crap about 'you have no idea blah blah blah'.