The Torah allows the eating of pork
The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.
After 4 votes and with 2 points ahead, the winner is...
- Publication date
- Last updated date
- Type
- Standard
- Number of rounds
- 3
- Time for argument
- One week
- Max argument characters
- 10,000
- Voting period
- One month
- Point system
- Multiple criterions
- Voting system
- Open
It's all in the title. My reasoning is surprise.
Effectively a single round debate.
"11:7 And the swine, though he divide the hoof, and be clovenfooted, yet he cheweth not the cud; he is unclean to you."
It was pretty hard for pro to recover from quoting a ban on eating pork. Trying to argue one breed of pig would be fine, rubs against the tradition, and needed more information (perhaps a quote from a rabbi okaying it?). An implied problem is if it would be allowed, would the Torah still call it swine? ... Another path to victory, would have been citing some special circumstance (as an example, Muslims are allowed to eat pork if hungry).
Trying to redefine cud, was an area con excelled on the defense, since we have thousands of years of one definition. It's a case where maybe translations should be updated to say grass instead of cud, but both debaters agreed on the intended meaning.
Conduct for forfeiture.
Sources lean slightly to con, but not by enough to merit the points.
Argument: in the first round, pro argued that pigs chew the cud, but ignores the verse, 11:7 which specifically states that swine do not chew the cud. pro further stated that the Torah meant, in the regard, that eating grass constituted chewing cud, but there is no reference cited for this claim, and is, therefore a fail. In Con's argument, there was no rebuttal of the "eat grass" claim, however, Con rightly argued that the "Black Hog" Pro argument was irrelevant. Points to Con
Sourcing: by Pro was nearly exclusively wikipedia, which is fine for 1st level research, but is, by its own admission, an inaccurate source. Con used much more varied, and on-point deeper sourcing. Sourcing decision should be based on "relaible" sourcing. Points to Con
This was an interesting one, and I really felt that if this progressed the Con could muster out a win. You could certainly see he was on the right track especially when we had Pro agree to definitions based in the Torah.
Con made a few mistakes, notably the anatomical assumption of pigs, and other animals, no references to that.
He is feisty and has good logic. I hope his parents let him back here. Both made good use of references, S&G was nothing worth points, and the forfeit was not his fault.
This is an interesting one. it may have looked like Con was getting the upperhand. His point about Judaists during that period, that created the religious beliefs, probably have more understanding of their own beliefs than modern day historians, sounds plausible. Then again, Pro is looking at it from a historical perspective, the same as those from wikipedia, and not a religious one. And given Con forfeited the round, then got banned from debate.art by his parents, suggests the historical perspective is possibly more reliable.
I think also wikipedia is a better source than the Torah, for historical information.
And Pro obviously had the better conduct by continuing to debate and not forfeiting
Instead of focusing on leviticus. Take a look at deuteronomy 12:15,21-22
what is acceptable for offering vs eating
I have a question: How is this book written? And how do we obey them? Like no matter how dirty the beef is we can eat it, and no matter how clean the pork is we can't eat it? WHAT?
Gotcha. It's unrated, so no big deal.
My parents won't let me access DART too much, so posting stuff is hard.
pro stated: "...pigs chew cud by the definition of the Torah. Unfortunately, pigs aren't ruminants."
Now that round 1 is complete. let's clear the air. Pigs are not ruminants, confirmed. However, there is no confusion over the definition of "cud." What the raw material happens to be is of no consequence; grass or some other vegetation. "Cud" is any vegetation consumed that is literally regurgitated to the mouth to be re-chewed. According to the OED: "Rumination: 2.a. The action of chewing the cud; the chewing by a herbivorous animal of partially digested food from the rumen." According to the same source: "Rumen: The first and largest stomach of a ruminant, in which food (esp. cellulose) is partly digested by bacteria, and from which it may pass back to the mouth as cud for further chewing, or on into the reticulum."
Given that the Torah stipulated two conditions: cloven hoof AND chewing cud [rumination], and that both must be met, it doesn't matter that pigs eat grass, in addition to just about everything else, eating grass, alone, is not descriptive of rumination; therefore, pigs do not meet the Torah's prohibition against non-cud chewers.
I'm in.
Unrated now.
Make the debate unrated, and I might accept.
Interested?