RT Article
T1 Animals, Empathy, and Ra?amim in the Study of Religion: A Case Study of Jewish Opposition to Hunting
JF Studies in religion
VO 46
IS 4
SP 511
OP 535
A1 Gross, Aaron S.
LA English
PB Sage
YR 2017
UL https://www.ixtheo.de/Record/1580856187
AB Both classical and contemporary Jewish texts, surveyed here, articulate a religious opposition to hunting for sport. This essay interprets compassion-based rabbinic opposition to hunting as reflecting a pragmatic concern with cultivating a regard and even a reverence for the capacities of empathy and sympathy. In particular, this “redescription” will analyze the rabbinic opposition to hunting in terms of more basic “building blocks” of religion, specifically empathy and sympathy as defined by the life sciences. I conclude that the most complete way to understand compassion-based rabbinic opposition to hunting is as, simultaneously, a society-forming performance, a symbolic statement about human attitudes towards life, and—the focus of the present essay—a vehicle for responding to the “building block” capacities for empathy and sympathy. A concluding section considers the implications of this case study for religious studies, arguing for the value of considering animals as participants in religious ritual.
K1 Judaism
K1 Animal
K1 Compassion
K1 Empathie
K1 Empathy
K1 Hunting
K1 Judaïsme
K1 pitié
K1 ritualchasse
K1 Rituel
K1 souffrance
K1 Suffering
K1 Sympathy
DO 10.1177/0008429817732031