Judaism
and Vegetarianism
Reviewed
by Lewis Regenstein
With mad cow disease and the increase in death from
heart attacks, strokes, cancer, and other diseases
associated with meat consumption so much in the news,
Professor Richard Schwartz's new edition of Judaism
and Vegetarianism is more timely than ever. The book
eloquently discusses and documents how the tenets
of Judaism, requiring us to be compassionate toward
animals, feed the hungry, help the poor, protect the
natural environment, and maintain good health, can
be fulfilled by adopting a vegetarian diet. He shows
how such a diet can help play an important role in
reducing global hunger, pollution, resource depletion,
poverty, cruelty to animals, and threats to human
health and welfare. For example, he cites the fact
that 70 percent of the grain grown in the United states,
and over a third grown worldwide, is fed to farmed
animals, as millions of people face starvation. Moreover,
raising animals for our meat-centered diets causes
more pollution and destruction or degradation of natural
resources, such as water, than all other human activities
combined.
This book, by the author considered the top authority
on the subject, is a "must" read for anyone
interested in Judaism, the environment, human health,
and how the teachings of Judaism can literally save
the world for future generations.
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