1 hour ago, gfweb said:
Opens up another discussion...were the dietary laws (and other restrictions on Jews) done for practical reasons or religious ones designed to set the people apart from others?
Not necessarily set apart, but maybe help them to thrive in a certain environment, e.g. the matzo as a long lasting & spoil resistant bread alternative ?
A colleague in university came from Haifa and whenever I had a Mettbrötchen (raw minced pork on a rye roll) for breakfast, he said that that would be a death sentence at home. I always assumed for religious reasons, given that pork is a no go for both Jews and Muslims alike, but one day he explained that pigs carry so many diseases/parasites in warmer climates plus the ambient temperatures in conjunction with the raw mince would make my favorite snack probably as healthy as slurping raw sewage. So, to forbid certain foods can have significant benefits for a population.
I never got him to try it, not even on a Matzo cracker ...
