WATCH: Why Religious Jews Should Join Israel’s Vegan Revolution

Illustration: At The Shuk by Lina Nagano [CC BY-NC 2.0] via Flickr

Israel has become acknowledged as the vegan capital of the world, with growing numbers opting for a non-animal based diet, and likewise a new University of Washington study found that Israel has the lowest rate of diet-related deaths in the world.

And yet to a large extent, the benefits of the healthy plant based diet popular in the Jewish state has encountered difficulties taking root among religious Jews, many of whom were taught that eating meat is at the least a necessity, and at the most a religious directive.

Asa Keisar, an Israeli religious scholar, has taken it upon himself to set the record straight on what the most authoritative Jewish sources actually say about meat eating in a series of edifying videos with English subtitles.

In a short lecture, Keisar explains the Torah injunction against causing suffering to animals, citing various texts in his argument against the shocking conditions rampant in the meat and dairy industries.

For those wishing to dive deeper into the topic of Jewish veganism, Keisar has released a longer lecture ranging over a much large number of sources, thoroughly investigating Judaism’s position on the topic.

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Keisar is known for his views on veganism as both a Torah imperative to avoid cruelty to animals and the Torah’s ideal for mankind. He is the author of Velifnei Iver HaShalem (Hebrew); our thanks go to our valued reader below for providing the link to Keisar's book in English as In Front Of The Blind. Please click here to read. Please click here for more from this scholar in The Jerusalem Herald.