Is gelatin part of "lahm?"
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As we know, God prohibits "lahm al khinzeer" to eat, amongst other things. What I'm wondering is Is gelatin considered "lahm" from a linguistic/Quranic/logical standpoint? This thread isn't about prohibitions in general - just to understand if gelatin is "lahm." I feel like people always easily say "fat is allowed and meat is prohibited," but they rarely mention gelatin.
This is a good question. I have only ever heard the Hadither perspectives on this.
However when the Quran tells us not to eat Swine Flesh or Meat, I really wonder why this ordinance is in place. I have wondered about it for a long time.
I always thought that perhaps its because the Swine is so biologically similar to humans, but this is only speculation based on some science and not to do with Quranic ordinance. However there is a lot of human tissue and blood comparability with Swines - and Swines are also used in transplantation research by pharma companies
Nevertheless, if we are not to eat the meat, then if there are contaminants from the meat that contaminate the connective tissue (where Gelatin is produced), then I would imagine that gelatin would be included in the ban on Swine Flesh.
By contamination I am talking about the Fibroblast cells and the precursor cells for Fibroblasts that could share an origin to the cells in muscles. Again this is speculative on my part as a reason.
I personally would avoid general gelatin products as they may contain swine Gelatin but I could understand if each person makes their own decision on this.
I guess it is a somewhat like the consumption of Alcohol - we are told that it is not good for us and a handiwork of Satan due to its intoxication qualities (it is not explicitly forbidden outright though), but many folk consume alcohol - Even some who don't consume alcohol are ok with alcohol in medicine (rightly) as well as in perfume (also rightly in my opinion).
Mind you the irony with not drinking the intoxicating alcohol in "Muslim" countries is strange as many people there smoke and produce Marijuana.
Anyway you are welcome to have your candy floss and eat but you won't see me eating it - although I worry even about eating "Halal" meat from some restaurants and takeaways due to the quantity of salt used in it and its sheer unhealthy feel the day after....
Salam
Ed -
I think that this distinction between fat, muscle, gelatine or whteve from the pig, is splitting hairs. Anything you eat from the pork is laHma, meat. That is what is forbidden is pig as a food. If gelatin comes in medicines for example or any other thing, it is something else.
s to why, it is, I gather because as fod it is not healthy. Let us think that the Qur'an does not say a word about eating rats or other animals, why? because those animals are never in the diet of anybody. Pigs are. So warning about rats would be warning about something we wouln't do anyway. Whereas pigs have usually been inthe dieta of many people.
I do nto have any doubt the pig is not healthy. You are not going to die if you eat pig once, twice... most probably, but to sustain a diet of pig is unhealthy, and where other meats may be expensive or harder to breed, pig is very easy, so the temptation to eat pig by many people, mostly poor people is very much t. We see in times of crisis, like now in Spain, I am seeing much more pig in the shelves of the food shops, than some years ago.
As peole have more means pork demand diminishes. Not chicken, for instance, which is also cheap, but pork does. Older peole stop eating pork by themselves or by medical prescription.
So, if there are other animals far better for health, why pork which is heavy and a very burden onthe metabolism.
Something else is where there is no possibility to eat other things. Better pig than no food at all.
Salaam
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Salam huruf,
Agree on splitting hairs on different parts of swine but imagine if one takes a heart from a pig and eats that - or a smaller part of a heart - maybe a blood vessel - or maybe just a small part of a tissue from a pig? What about a few cells from the pig?
Then, what about some small part of the stuff inside cells from a pig?All this will matter if the tissues, cells or molecules from pig have a uniqueness about - for example, the many animals share molecules that are the same, but they have unique signatures that make them stand out as being from a specific animal.
So if one wants to split hairs, could one eat molecules from a pig or something bigger?
These are not questions necessarily for you but questions that come to mind.
Many people in Beijing do eat rats - heck the French eat frogs. In Italy they ear a cheese with lava in it - arrghhh!
There are all sorts of diets.
My friend sent me a picture from Thailand a few days ago of a street stall that was selling marinated silkworms, grasshoppers and all sorts of other insects - I thought to myself - would I?
As it is not banned or even referred to remotely in the Quran - I thought why shouldn't I?
Then again the psychology of food that I have grown up with would still prevent me, but I hoped to think I would have the courage to try the insects!
Regarding Pig - The Quran does actually say that you can eat pig if there is not other food - and if you are not actually craving to eat pig - doesn't it?
Salam
Ed -
There is nogthing wrong with frogs. It is a delicacy, and not only in France people eat them if they get them, and snails and worms, and I ate in Mexico a kind of beetle which is almost all of it iodine, and they are eaten even live, and they also have antseggs, but that does not constitute and everyday diet whereas pig, where it is eaten tends to be an everyday diet or nearly and eaten even in almost every meal in one form or another, like adding larder or ham to any dish. Rats I doubt it, unless really you are suffering famine. Not to mistake rats with animals that ressemble them but are not them. And many people ate cats during the war. But those animals do not get into the diet usual diet, pig, where it is eaten it is very much eaten, not occasionally.
Salaam
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Well, I once ate a kebab from a "halal" takeaway - and it was the most disgusting and salty thing I ever ate - but there you go!
Anyway, In France they eat frogs daily and in Africa and Phillipines they have other weird and wonderful culinaries. Believe me in China people do eat rats - there have been plenty of article about them.
I was once walking down the road in a city in China and I saw a board outside a pet shop with pictures of dogs, cats and all sorts of animals - when I got closer, I realized it was a restaurant! Diets really do vary significantly.
You are right - in Italy, during the war folk regularly used to eat cats - in the country side, some still do!I know there is nutritious food of all sorts, but for me a nice roast (of chicken, lamb or beef) more than does the trick - I have been offered frogs legs, but in the UK we are taught by the all seeing media to not like frogs very much
Anyway, back to the pig, for me all constituents are off limits - and personally I believe it has something to do with its similarity to man.
Salam
Ed -
Well, I once ate a kebab from a "halal" takeaway - and it was the most disgusting and salty thing I ever ate - but there you go!
Anyway, In France they eat frogs daily and in Africa and Phillipines they have other weird and wonderful culinaries. Believe me in China people do eat rats - there have been plenty of article about them.
I was once walking down the road in a city in China and I saw a board outside a pet shop with pictures of dogs, cats and all sorts of animals - when I got closer, I realized it was a restaurant! Diets really do vary significantly.
You are right - in Italy, during the war folk regularly used to eat cats - in the country side, some still do!I know there is nutritious food of all sorts, but for me a nice roast (of chicken, lamb or beef) more than does the trick - I have been offered frogs legs, but in the UK we are taught by the all seeing media to not like frogs very much
Anyway, back to the pig, for me all constituents are off limits - and personally I believe it has something to do with its similarity to man.
Salam
EdYes there is a similarity even in taste. Once I met a man who had eaten human flesh when being with a tribe which used to practice canibalism on special occasions of peole who did very bad things, and he said thing most similar was pork, which really says a lot about us. At any rate we both have the subcutaneous layer of fat, and it is prooved that to metabolise pig tkes much, much longer than other meats. So it is heavier work for the body which is may be a reason why at least som ginecologists tell their patients to not eat pork during pregnancy.
Salaam
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Yes there is a similarity even in taste. Once I met a man who had eaten human flesh ......
SalaamSay hi to Hannibal - I miss his TV episodes. )
I cannot validate what you say, but would tend to read and agree - from a science perspective there are so many similarities - ie organs, translplantation, blood etc.
Salam
Ed -
Salam guys,
the meaning of the root La-Ha-Mim
Lam-Ha-Miim = flesh/meat, to feed with flesh, skin/hide/cloth.Lane says ; meaning a garment, or piece of cloth, and a skin, or <b>hide</b>. (TA in art. .)
Does that maybe mean that al-lahm is the flesh and the hide, or just the flesh?
http//www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=lHm&fromdoc=Perseustext2002.02.0045
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As we know, God prohibits "lahm al khinzeer" to eat, amongst other things. What I'm wondering is Is gelatin considered "lahm" from a linguistic/Quranic/logical standpoint? This thread isn't about prohibitions in general - just to understand if gelatin is "lahm." I feel like people always easily say "fat is allowed and meat is prohibited," but they rarely mention gelatin.
http//quranstruelight.com/thematic-translation-installments-1-35-in-english/installment-28-eating-and-drinking
You can read that and start eating -