Dear Yehuda,



In the essay What the Sages Knew About Fish we write three things clearly leading to the conclusion that they had no clue about the signs of kashrut in fish. More than that, they ruled incorrect halachot, forbade the permitted and permitted the forbidden.

1. We wrote that there is a fish which has scales but no fins, in contradiction to the Talmudic dictum “Whatever has scales has fins.” This fish is called Monopterus cuchia. It does indeed have fins on its chest the first 10 days of its life, which afterwards fall off, but Halachically this is not considered a fin. If an accepted religious arbiter or the Chief Rabbinate [send them a letter and ask them] will permit this fish with clear reasons, we can deal with that claim. At the moment, in our opinion this fish is not acceptable for eating. Another thing: according to ichthyologists this fish does not have a tail fin, as you wrote. Though the meaning of Monopterus is “one fin,” in fact it has no fin at all. Please give a source for your words or some research journal which would back your claims. [Why do religious people usually make up their claims and don’t bring sources for their words?]

2. We cited rabbis, according to whom we should not rely on this rule of “whatever has scales has no fins.” The rabbis themselves reject the claim of outreach activists, who don’t blanch at using lies and hiding the opinion of their own rabbis.

3. Chazal permitted fish based on incorrect signs. For example: A fish which has a wide head and a spine is permitted. This sign is utter nonsense, and so Chazal permitted a forbidden fish.

Read the whole article and see the foolishness and nonsense which were spoken by Chazal. To make things even more painful, we’ll give one example: the fish which rests on the Sabbath. “There is a fish in the seas which does not swim on the Sabbath, but rests all day long near the shore or a rock.” The book Pardes HaMelech, Minhagei Shabbat Kodesh, brings “a wonderful story…about a wise man who investigated as to the habitat of this fish, which is only in Persia, and went there…and he saw that when it was Friday at sunset… it fell to the shore. The whole Sabbath Gentiles hit it with spears and swords, but it did not move until the end of the Sabbath.”



Sincerely,



Daat Emet

Hello,



From your emotional words we could conclude that Judaism hasn’t even a bit of light. A person who was the slightest bit rational would have argued to the point, not cried about the helplessness of her faith.



The precise quotation you wanted was “Your destroyers and despisers will come from

within yourself” (Isaiah 49:17).



He meant the Torah and commandment fulfilling public, because of whom the holy temple was destroyed. If you carefully read history books you will see that those who were zealous for the word of the Lord were those who caused the destruction, because of their total faith.

On the other hand, the building up of the land and the establishment of a state for the Jews was done by those who managed to brush off the fulfillment of Torah and the commandments.



Sincerely,



Daat Emet

Dear Din,



We have no Halachic proof because Halacha never addressed the reality of a fish like this, since it did not know of such a phenomenon. The likelihood is that this sort of fish would not be considered to have a fin.

This question should be passed on to a religious arbiter, who will write an answer with the details of his conclusion.



Sincerely,



Daat Emet