Day 227: "His Mercy Is Upon All His Works"
In high school, I had a lot of friends who were, obviously, Jewish but who also didn't seem to understand that humans were created in God's image, humans have souls, while animals were not created in God's image and therefore, don't have souls. I love that they love their pets to that extent, but they were blatantly ignoring this Jewish teaching.
Acknowledging that animals and humans are different does not mean that we don't respect animals. Of course we respect animals, we try to be as gentle and caring as possible and the rules of shechting animals calls for the slaughter to happen in the most painless possible way.
Judaism looks kindly on vegetarianism but eating meat is also recognized as a human need and is totally allowed. In fact, the characteristics of a joyous/festive meal in Judaism is the eating and drinking of meat and wine (unless you are a vegetarian or recovering alcoholic in which case you are urged to ignore this tradition).
Day 228: Be Kind to Your Enemy's Animal
As I wrote above, we like animals. We love animals. We care for them and are commanded to treat them kindly.
Judaism also teaches that disputes between people should not get in the way of how any animal owned by either party is treated. If your enemy's animal is struggling, injured, in pain, or being mistreated, no matter how you feel about the owner, you must help the animal.
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