Torah Portion: Ki Sisa

Do not cook a kid in its mother’s milk (Shemos 34:26).

It is a negative commandment to not eat meat and milk that were cooked together, as it is written, Do not cook a kid in its mother’s milk (Shemos 34:26), which refers to eating and benefiting from meat cooked with milk. The reason why the Torah did not explicitly write “do not eat meat with milk” is because of a unique aspect of this prohibition, that even if the person did not enjoy eating them — such as when he swallowed them when they were burning hot — he is nevertheless liable.

The laws of the mitzvah include: On the Scriptural level the prohibition against meat with milk only applies to the meat of a kosher-type domesticated animal (beheima tehora), but not to a non kosher-type animal, nor to any non-domesticated animals (chayah) — even of kosher species — nor to fowl of any sort, both kosher and kosher-types. However, the Sages prohibited eating these other creatures as a safeguard for the prohibition of the meat of a domesticated animal (which is Biblically prohibited), so that people do not confuse one type of meat with another. But the Sages did not institute any prohibitions regarding fish and kosher locust, because their flesh does not resemble the flesh of a beheima at all, so there is no chance that anybody would err on their account.

This mitzvah applies in all places and at all time, to both men and women.