עברית
Halachot and Customs
Why is poultry considered meat?
Question
Greetings, honorable Rabbi.
The prohibition against mixing meat and milk applies to a kid goat in its mother’s milk, to prevent causing suffering to souls. A kid is from the category of cattle, and poultry belongs to the category of birds. If it is not permitted to mix a kid with its mother’s milk, how is it then allowed to combine egg with poultry? Isn’t that like the same thing?
Answer
Greetings and blessings,
I have not found the reason you mentioned regarding meat and milk. In any case, poultry meat in milk is forbidden rabbinically, as explained by the Rambam in Hilchot Ma"achalot Asurot, Chapter 9, Halacha 4.
It states: "Meat of a wild animal and poultry, whether in the milk of a wild animal or of a domesticated animal, is not forbidden by Torah law for consumption; hence it is permitted to cook and benefit from such a mixture, but it is forbidden to eat it by rabbinic decree so that people will not err and come to transgress the Torah prohibition of meat and milk by eating meat of a kosher domesticated animal in the milk of a kosher domesticated animal. Since the verse literally means a kid in its mother’s milk—the Torah prohibition applies only to that—therefore all meat in milk was forbidden by the Sages."
Wishing you success,
Binyamin Shmueli
