Selected Reform Responsa

Animals which endangered human beings such as wolves and lions could be destroyed(Ber. 13a). This was even more true of pestilent insects such as grasshoppers, mosquitoes or scorpions and ants. Crop eating field mice and rats could also be destroyed(Taanit 19a; 14a; Shab. 121 b: M. K. 6b). The Midrash which sought to find a use for some such animals like fleas and mosquitoes stated that they were created in order to plague evil people(Midrash Rabbah Vayikra 189).

Animals could be used by man as long as they were treated kindly. It is prohibited to consume a limb from a living animal(B. M. 32b). An animal that is threshing may not be muzzled; it must be permitted to eat as freely as a human being(Deut. 23.25 f, B. M. 87b, 90a: Yad Hil Zekirut 13.3; Shulhan Arukh Hoshen Mishpat 338). Furthermore, one should not consider acquiring an animal unless one has the means to feed it(J. Ket. 4.8) and a person should then feed his animals before feeding himself(Git . 62a; Yad Hil. Avadim 9.8).

Unnecessary pain may not be inflicted on animals(Ex. 23.5; B. M. 32a; Yad Hil. Rotzeah 13.9; Solomon ben Aderet Responsa#252 #257). Some of the medieval scholars who were concerned with the protection of animals felt that those precautions needed to be stricter than with human beings, as animals do not have the intelligence to care for themselves or to take a longer view of matters(Yad Hil Zekhirut 13.2; David ibn Zimri Responsa 1#728; Yair Hayim Bacharach Havat Yair#191; Shulhan Arukh Hoshen Mishpat 337.2). Biblical law prohibited the killing of a mother with its young(Lev 12.28: Hul. 83a: Yad Hil. Shehitah 13; Shulhan Arukh Yoreh Deah 16). The later Jewish codes also insisted that a seller inform a buyer of the relationship between any animals sold so that a mother and its offspring would not be slaughtered together on the same day. A similar kind of provision forbade the taking of both a mother and a chick from the same nest.(Deut. 12.6; Hul. 138b Shulhan Arukh Yoreh Deah 292).

Kindness to animals included the lightening of the load from an overburdened animal(Ex. 13.5). Domestic animals were required