What happens to a society that has more mercy for their animals than for their own citizens? What values are ingrained in a person who would rather save his pet than another human?

At last Europe has thrown off its mask. No it still isn’t politically correct to hate Jews publicly or to say so directly. Europe isn’t about to make a declaration of anti-Semitism. The shadow of World War II still hovers over the continent and the names like Auschwitz Majdanek and Bergen-Belsen still cast an insidious shadow. So for now they are taking humanitarianism and turning it into a weapon against the Jewish race. For years the avodah zarah of so-called “human rights” has been used as a weapon against Israel and now there is a new mantra: “cruelty to animals.”

The first-stage goal is to prohibit Jewish ritual slaughter. It’s clear that once the Netherlands passes the anti-shechitah law shechitah is liable to be outlawed throughout Europe especially the “enlightened” nations of Western Europe. We can expect a domino effect as the old familiar anti-Semitism makes a comeback under the guise of “animal rights.” And for those who think I’m exaggerating that I’m an incurable paranoid who has yet to recover from the Holocaust allow me to demonstrate that I am looking at this from the point of view of gedolei Yisrael.

Rav Moshe Mordechai Epstein ztz”l rosh yeshivah of Yeshivas Slabodka both in Europe and in Eretz Yisrael was once visiting Germany. He observed a woman sitting on a park bench kissing her pet dog. In shock he predicted: “They’ll be slaughtering people in this country one of these days. For it says in the pasuk ‘Butchers of people will kiss calves” (Hoshea 13).

This was years before Hitler came to power years before the Holocaust. What was it that Rav Epstein perceived? A total distortion of the status of man in relation to animals. When a human being thinks of an animal in the same way he is required to think of his fellowman when he sees man and animal as equals deserving of equal treatment when he kisses hugs and hovers over an animal to shower it with goodness as if it were like one of his own kind then the dividing line between man and animal is erased.

He then begins to see man as a kind of animal at best as the highest level of animal. Man’s unique status as a tzelem Elokim with a heavenly neshamah is discarded and there is no longer any difference between his life or death and that of an animal. This is a new world where not long ago a wedding ceremony was held for tens of “dog couples ” complete with white veils and signing a “marriage contract” with a paw-print. When even the Israeli army has set up a special cemetery for dogs killed in action with memorial services – complete with wreaths and flowers -- on the anniversary of the day they fell we clearly have a problem. And although these things might seem essentially harmless if peculiar indeed the unfortunate truth is that the loss of a sense of the human status with its Divine soul as opposed to the animal status whose vivifying force is exclusively the lower  nefesh behamis brings destructive results in its wake.

The following are just a few mild examples of the distorted relationship between man and animal so prevalent in our society.

An American girl from a good Reform home had a dog named “Mom.” The girl who was participating in a Jewish identity seminar was asked by a Torah-observant lecturer “If your dog were drowning in a river and near him you saw a person drowning which one would you save first?” The sixteen-year-old girl replied “I’d save Mom of course. She’s my dog. I know her.”

This girl would let a human being drown before her eyes because in her system of thought her own beloved dog has more of a right to be saved from death than a human stranger. Is this the new moral code of our times?

The same lecturer told of a recent encounter with an anti-meat activist who sat next to him on a plane. Seeing him eat his Glatt kosher meal the vegetarian activist informed the rabbi that he was so appalled by a person who could eat flesh that he could kill someone who would slaughter a cow for food. His pity for the animal drove him over the brink to the point where he demoted man to the level of an animal. A more sophisticated species perhaps than the rest of the animals roaming the earth — but an animal nonetheless.

Once when I was part of a group visiting the Auschwitz death camp we were standing outside the lodgings of the camp commander the accursed Rudolf Hess yimach shemo. The tour guide told us that this mass murderer was a vegetarian and a member of an animal rights society. Why? Because once he had seen a calf being led to the slaughter and he couldn’t bear the pleading look in the eyes of the animal which sensed its impending doom.  

Then there is the not-so famous letter expressing horror at the killing of innocent animals. After reading the words try to guess the author: 

“How can one take pleasure Mr. Kershten in shooting from under cover at creatures grazing at the edge of a forest innocent helpless unsuspecting creatures? That is really pure murder! Nature is so beautiful and glorious and all living things have a right to live. This is precisely the outlook that I so admire in our forefathers. For example they made an official declaration of war against mice and rats demanding that they stop their acts of looting and leave a specific region within a certain time before launching a campaign of extermination against them. You will find that all the other ancient peoples had similar respect for living creatures. Recently I was very interested to hear that even today Buddhist monks carry a bell to warn the animals of the forest to move away so they should not be hurt. Yet in our society people step on every insect and kill every worm.”

Incredibly these words were written by Heinrich Himmler yimach shemo the Gestapo commander who oversaw the building of the concentration camps. This black-hearted man was a member of a society against cruelty to animals who would actually be moved to tears at the sight of a suffering cat. Need I say more?

Let us not misunderstand. The prohibition of causing needless pain to animals is an injunction from the Torah and from our Torah the nations of the world also learned to exercise some restraint in their cruel treatment of animals. How is it possible then that the Torah with its primal concern for all living things could suddenly turn cruel when it comes to slaughtering an animal for food? We too have have an obligation to be appreciative and considerate of animals and to show gratitude toward animals from which we benefit as we learn from Yaakov Avinu who sent Yosef to look for his brothers with the words “Go please and see how your brothers are faring and how the flock is faring” (Bereishis 37: 14).

The Midrash asks “How your brothers are faring that is understandable. But what is the meaning of  ‘how the flock is faring’? This tells us that a person should ask after the welfare of a thing from which he has benefit” (Midrash Rabbah 64).

This obligation however has no bearing on the clear separation and difference between man and animals. This being so neither the Netherlands nor all of Europe will teach us how to show mercy to animals. People who confuse kindness to animals with cruelty to humans have nothing to instruct on this subject.

Food for Thought

I am not afraid of Gehinnom I am only afraid of being seated in Gan Eden next to a fool (Rebbe Naftali of Kopschitz)