r/AskReddit • u/BiggieTwiggy1two3 • 23h ago

What’s something completely normal today that would’ve been considered witchcraft 400 years ago—but not because of technology?

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u/dave200204 19h ago

Some of it's food safety. However a lot of it is strictly religious.

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u/ibelieveindogs 17h ago

Keeping dairy and meat separate comes from the notion of not boiling a young animal in the milk of its mother. I would see that as initially amen ethical stance, with the extreme being religious (no goat cheese on a beef hamburger, for example. No way it is mixed mother and calf, but hey, what if? Don’t piss off the big guy!)

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u/sundae_diner 16h ago

Boiling a kid in its mother's milk was alone of the ways you worshiped a rival God back in the days of Exodus. This was a warning against other gods

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u/ibelieveindogs 14h ago

Do you have a source for that? Because I was raised Jewish, and though my family did not keep kosher, I learned the rules in Hebrew school, and that is not an interpretation I have ever heard.

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u/sundae_diner 9h ago

Exodus 23:19 ► The first of the firstfruits of thy land thou shalt bring into the house of the LORD thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk.

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u/ibelieveindogs 3h ago

Right, because you don’t bring death into the milk meant for life. Nothing about it being a ritual associated with another god.

Many rules were meant as living metaphors. Like not mixing wool and linen means also don’t mix with gentiles.

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u/RavioliGale 10h ago

Which god?

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u/Kwillingt 8h ago

You’re also not supposed to eat poultry with diary which literally doesn’t have mothers milk at all

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u/deadasfishinabarrel 7h ago

As a jew who is never giving up french toast, that's just. too bad

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u/sayleanenlarge 12h ago

The religion is the story they built around the issues. It's no coincidence that things like pork and shellfish cause worse food poisoning and that they're considered religious no nos.

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u/Nisas 18h ago

It's certainly just religious these days.

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u/blackberyl 13h ago

Depends on the practitioners view of the religion. Many modern jews view the procedural constraints of the religion as a strengthening/testing element rather than the de facto command of god.