Talk:Moral status of animals in the ancient world/Archive 1

Jainism
Surprisingly Jainism which is as old as 9 century BC and advocates complete non-violence against animals, is not at all mentioned in this article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Skbhat (talk • contribs) 10:08, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Sri Lanka
Hi Ela, just letting you know that I removed the Sri Lanka material from Animal rights, because it's too specific for the main article, and when I came to add it here, I saw you'd already done it. Thanks for doing that. SlimVirgin talk| contribs 18:55, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

Bible interpretaions
The first chapter of Genesis describes how God gave human beings dominion over animals, tempered throughout the Torah, or Old Testament, by injunctions to be kind. Severing a limb from a live animal and eating it was forbidden (Genesis 9:4)''Citation requested for the interpretation of the passage as kindness towards the animal. The translations I find say: "But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat." or "Only, you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood.". This is clearly a prohibition of the consumption of blood, a prohibition that Jews still observe, and by no means a prohibition of the "severing a limb from a live animal"., cattle were to be rested on the Sabbath (Exodus 20:10; 23:12), a cow and her calf were not to be killed on the same day (Leviticus 22:28Citation requested for the interpretation of the passage as kindness towards the animal. It is clear that it is a taboo of some sort, but the Biblical text gives no motivation for it.), a person had to feed his animals before himself (Deuteronomy 11:15Citation requested for the interpretation of the passage as a command. The text says "And I will give grass in thy fields for thy cattle, and thou shalt eat and be satisfied"; I think it's very far-fetched to interpret this as a command concerning order; rather, it's obvious both from the wording and the context that it is a cause-and-effect relationship - you can eat because God gives you the grass necessary for you to keep your cattle''), animal suffering had to be relieved (Deuteronomy 12:4), oxen treading the corn were not to be muzzled (Deuteronomy 14:21, kids were not to be cooked in their mother's milk (Deuteronomy 14:21Citation requested for the interpretation of the passage as kindness towards the animal. Again, there is some kind of taboo here, but it is by no means clear that this way of cooking is any more or less humane to the animal than any other.), mother birds not to be disturbed while sitting on eggs (Deuteronomy 22:6-7Citation requested for the interpretation of the passage as "not disturbing the mother bird". The translations I see prohibit taking *both* the young and the mother: "you shall not take the mother with the young". That is, you should leave the mother, but you may take the young without her. This may also be a rational way to preserve the population of birds.), and oxen and asses not to be yoked together (Deuteronomy 22:10).''Citation requested for the interpretation of the passage as kindness towards the animal. There is some kind of taboo, but no "humane" motivation is given in the text. Rather, the context shows that the key thing is a prohibition against mixing two different things: the immediately following command is "You shall not wear clothes made of wool and linen woven together." and the immediately preceding one prohibits sowing your vineyard with two different kinds of seed.''

I hope that this is enough to convince everyone that at least half of the Bible references here are used in an extremely inappropriate way. If someone is capable of disputing this, it's probably hopeless to argue with that someone; therefore, I don't intend to discuss this any further. --91.148.159.4 (talk) 00:02, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

As part of the everyone, no I'm not convinced. The 10 commandments include an injunction against killing human beings-- without any interpretation. But if someone were going to say that this might have been about the unavailability of modern detergents for removing bloodstains from clothing-- well, I'd say that someone was the one who should be looking for a citation. And yeah, it is hopeless to argue with someone who's right! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.68.128.53 (talk) 21:03, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Bible
The section Moral status of animals in the ancient world says "It was only after the Flood that meat-eating was permitted either for humans or for animals." I'm no scholar but that seems to contradict Abel being a pastoralist doesn't it? I've read the BBC page, and it doesn't support this, but can't access the other source, Ryder, R. (2000). --Anthonyhcole (talk) 14:49, 20 November 2011 (UTC)


From the start it reads like a personal essay:

"The idea that the use of animals by humans—for food, clothing, entertainment, and as research subjects—is morally acceptable, springs mainly from two sources."

This claim rests on two seemingly off-the-cuff observations: a "Christian" concept (from the Torah) and "the idea that animals are inferior, because they lack rationality and language"

Somehow I can't believe that when a scientist fills out the paperwork necessary for dong experiments with living subjects she cites the Bible and notes that mice can't talk. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.68.128.53 (talk) 21:56, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Rename and expend the article
This article is not only about the ancient world. Most if not all religions/traditions mentioned in the article always exist. A better title would be 'cultural difference in moral status of animals' or 'moral status of animals in the world'. In fact I think this article should be summarized and insert into animal rights. For references please see the talk page of Animal rights.SSZvH7N5n8 (talk) 10:16, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Ancient Christianity should be updated
The particular wording in this section appears to have been sporked from its source, rather than written in a more direct manner. It reads a bit too informal and flowery to be properly encyclopedic to me. --151.190.40.1 (talk) 19:41, 27 October 2014 (UTC)

Globalization
We're missing discussion of at least East Asian thought, and the polytheism mention could be expanded significantly. ‎⠀Trimton⠀‎‎ 01:29, 1 May 2021 (UTC)