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May one slaughter kosher animals with a machine? I don't mean to ask this question about restraining animals, what I want to know is if one may use a machine to actually make the cut, to actually shecht with a machine.

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  • Is a human involved in making the machine function?
    – Double AA
    May 9, 2014 at 18:43
  • @DoubleAA See my answer
    – MTL
    May 9, 2014 at 18:57
  • I'm first trying to understand the question.
    – Double AA
    May 9, 2014 at 19:00
  • @DoubleAA Is it unclear?
    – MTL
    May 9, 2014 at 19:02
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    I don't really understand what you mean by "machine". A knife is a machine. A simple one, at least.
    – Double AA
    May 9, 2014 at 19:04

1 Answer 1

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Yes and no.


Surprisingly, Simlah Chadasha says (siman 7) that you may slaughter with a knife that is attached to a wheel (though only b'dieved, because of a wheel that is not כח אדם; and because it's difficult to do correctly).
However, restrictions apply:

  • The machine has to be human-powered, specifically by a Jew (think handcrank); or water-powered, where the water-gate is very close to the wheel and is released by a Jew [so that it is כח גברא.
    These methods may only be used when the person is actually still turning the wheel (when a person is turning the wheel), or on the first rotation of the wheel after releasing the water (or cranking the wheel and letting go, when a person turning the wheel).
  • The knife (obviously) has to be moving in a way that it can slaughter correctly (back and forth motion -- if your machine is a wheel, picture train wheels).
  • None of this can be attached to the ground, because a knife that is attached to the ground may not be used for shechita. See Simlah Chadasha 6:5.

Probably every mass-production kosher company read through these halachos, hoping for a way to make it work -- but the restrictions are too difficult, especially the one about not having the machine attached to the ground. So we still do need shochtim ;).

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