The rabbis on today’s daf continue their discussion of the prohibition against slaughtering an animal and its offspring on the same day. The mishnah states:
One who slaughters (an animal and her offspring) and one of them is discovered to be an animal with a wound that would have caused it to die within twelve months (a treifa), or one who slaughters for the sake of idol worship, or one who slaughters the red heifer of purification, or an ox that was to be stoned, or a heifer whose neck was to be broken — Rabbi Shimon deems him exempt.
The rabbis prohibit Jews from eating a treifa, an animal with a mortal injury. The rabbis also prohibit Jews from deriving benefit from all the other animals listed in the mishnah — an animal used in idol worship, an animal designated to be a red heifer of purification, a goring ox marked for execution by stoning, or a heifer that was to be killed in atonement for a person murdered by an unknown killer. For Rabbi Shimon, the prohibition against slaughtering an animal and her offspring is really a prohibition against the kind of slaughter that produces kosher meat for consumption. It’s about the ethics of food. And since one of these animals is not actually able to be food, the slaughterer is exempt from the punishment of lashes. (Though, as the Talmud will note, at least the person slaughtering for the sake of idol worship is still liable for the death penalty for that particular sin.)
And the rabbis deem him liable.
The rabbis see this mitzvah differently. For them, it’s about the ethics of the slaughter itself. It is forbidden to slaughter an animal and its offspring on the same day, regardless of whether both will be eaten. It’s about the person doing the act, not the product of the act.
But even for the rabbis, because this mitzvah is specifically about kosher slaughter, animals that are killed in other ways do not violate the prohibition against killing an animal and her offspring on the same day.
One who slaughters an animal and it becomes a carcass by his hand because the slaughter was invalid, or one who stabs, or one who uproots (the windpipe and gullet), is exempt with regard to a mother and its offspring.
Of course, I’d like to think that — with the exception of the first case, where someone tried to slaughter correctly and accidentally messed up — this animal killer would still be liable for transgressing the prohibition of tza’ar ba’alei chayim, causing pain to living creatures. But they are not liable for slaughtering an animal and its offspring on the same day.
Ultimately, while Rabbi Shimon sees this prohibition as being about the non-human animals themselves, the rabbis insist that it is about cultivating a particular kind of ethical human, one who is aware of the Torah’s commandments about kosher slaughter and is committed to doing it correctly. Some modern scholars and ethicists have even taken this a step further. Today, if you want a hamburger, you can go to the grocery store and buy some ground meat. Or you can just go to a restaurant and order one. But as Beth Berkowitz writes, in the ancient world, to follow the rabbinic laws of kashrut, “People had to know who their animal’s parent was. They had to know who their animal’s child was. To observe this law, people had to keep track of animal families. Today, we don’t even know that our animals have families, much less who those families are. Thinking of your hamburger as someone’s mother — it changes things.”
Or at least, maybe it should.
Read all of Chullin 81 on Sefaria.
This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on July 20, 2026. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.
Help us keep Jewish knowledge accessible to millions of people around the world. With your help, My Jewish Learning can provide endless opportunities for learning, connection and discovery.
