Parshat Shemini: The Talmud, The Torah
by Rabbi Lobel

For an animal to be Kosher it must have two bodily signs: its hooves must be thoroughly split and it must ruminate – i.e. chew its cud. (Leviticus 11:3)

The Torah lists four animals that ruminate but do not have split hooves: the camel, the hyrax, and the hare (Leviticus 11:4-7). The fourth is listed in Deuteronomy (14:7) – the shesua

The Torah lists only one animal that has thoroughly complete split hooves but does not ruminate – the pig. (Leviticus 11:8)

The Talmud (200 CE-500 CE; Hullin 59a) says that ruminating animals do not have teeth on their upper jaw since they have multiple stomachs and, therefore, don't need to thoroughly grind their food before digestion. The Halacha (Jewish Law) states that if one checks the mouth of an animal and finds no upper teeth and sees that the hooves are completely split, that evidence would be sufficient to conclude the animal is kosher. Furthermore, if the mouth was mutilated and one cannot determine if the animal has upper teeth, but it has thoroughly split hooves, if  one is certain it is not a pig it is a kosher animal. Why? The pig is the only animal in the world that has split hooves but does not ruminate. So says the Talmud.

The Talmud makes a similar declaration with regard to the camel, hare, hyrax, and shesua. “These are the only animals that ruminate and do not have thoroughly split hooves.”

There is a saying that what distinguishes science from religion is the ability to disprove a scientific theory. Yet, here the rabbis are making an absolute statement that should be easy to disprove. The rabbis are declaring that these animals are the only animals in all existence that have one sign but not the other. There never was nor ever will be any other exceptions.

How can the Sages of the Talmud be so confident to predict that no other exceptions will ever be discovered or even created? Why take the chance? Wouldn't it have been more prudent to hedge their bets and include an escape clause such as limiting their statements to the past or the Land of Israel? Even if the rabbis had absolute faith in the written Torah, these statements are only based upon an oral tradition.

Why, among all religions in the world, does Judaism alone make it so easy to be disproven? To steal a phrase from the Haggadah, what makes Judaism different from all other religions? All other religions were invented by man. The Torah, both written and oral (the Talmud), come from G-d and we can rely upon G-d to know if these animals are the only exceptions.