June 26, 2026 Categories: Halacha & Hashkafa / Torah
Daf Yomi
Incubator Chicks: The Dispute
“These Are the Living Things Which You May Eat”
(Chulin 42a)
The following statement is found in Responsa Yad Chanoch (34): “Our friend HaGaon Rabbi Shalom Mordechai HaKohen has permitted the fowl hatched by the heat of an electric machine into which eggs are put and from which chicks hatch quickly because of the heat, appearing to be fully developed, but the trouble is that they cannot live more than 12 months and also cannot bear offspring.” Many poskim ruled similarly when they were asked for their opinion about “fowl hatched from the heat of an electric machine,” meaning an incubator.
The question is whether such chicks are considered treifah.
Chazal, based on the verse (Vayikra 11:2) “Zos hachaya asher tochlu…” – These are the living things which you may eat – cited by our Gemara, ruled that an animal that cannot live more than 12 months is considered to be treifah.
Is an Animal That Is Naturally Short-lived Considered Treifah?
Rabbi Meir Arik, zt”l (Responsa Imrei Yosher 1:145) explains that there’s no doubt that a naturally short-lived animal is not treifah and even offers an interesting proof. The Midrash says (cited in Eretz HaChayim, Tehillim 39:4) that a certain bird, tzipor dror, lives 52 days, but nonetheless it serves to purify a metzora even though a treifah animal is disqualified for such purpose (Chulin 140a). The issue of the chicks arises because chicks that develop naturally live longer, whereas incubator chicks have a limited lifespan. Rabbi Arik tends to be strict and consider them treifah (see ibid., where he explains a suspicion that whatever causes the chicks to have a shorter lifespan is a reason to render them treifah; he bases his reasoning on Tosfos in Niddah 23a). However, the Maharsham disagrees (Responsa 3:378) and maintains that treifah pertains to an animal whose life is short due to a defect in its body. But in our case, there is no suspicion of a defect in the chick’s body; rather, it is born weak because the incubation does not form it properly, and it is like a weak animal which is only a mesukenes – an endangered animal about to die – which, as our Gemara explains, is not treifah.Incubator Eggs Are No Innovation
However, the author of Responsa Yad Chanoch contends (ibid.) that such chicks are neveilah. At first, he asserts that raising chicks in an incubator is no innovation: “That which you thought is something recently invented is not so. For even in the time of Ramban, who lived almost a thousand years ago, people knew how to hatch chicks by heating the stove to a certain temperature. We thus see that people knew about this in former times and in the land of Sini [China?] they would put the eggs in hot ashes at a certain temperature and produce chicks. And the voyager to the Orient, Rabbi Meshulam bar Rav Menachem of Valtira, zt”l, who traveled in 5241 (1581), recounted: ‘I saw Arabs growing fowl in stoves, for they heat the stove and put therein the excrement of cattle and horses and put there a thousand or 2,000 eggs, and chicks come out and they make fowl without end; therefore, fowl is very cheap there.’”In the Past, People Had Expertise in Hatching Eggs
The obvious question, then, is why the Rishonim did not discuss such chicks and rule that they are neveilah according to Rabbi Meir Arik or kosher according to the Maharsham. The Yad Chanoch explains that in former times, “people were expert in this work and did it properly. Therefore, it was simple for them to permit it and no one thought of any suspicion.” (He adds fascinating details in his reply: “And you should not wonder that they were better at this in former times. They knew how to do what is unknown in our time. Do not wonder, for Egyptian mummies and pyramids prove that recent generations, as much as they try, do not know how it is done. The same applies to the cup of herbal roots given to a woman so that she not become pregnant, which is unknown in our time.”)Anesthetics Used Thousands of Years Ago
“And witness a wonder that for an ill person who needed an operation, Jewish doctors knew 2,000 years ago to give a sleeping potion so that he would not feel pain, as explained in Bava Metzia 83b about Rabbi Elazar b. Rabbi Shimon, who was about to be operated on and was given a sleeping potion. And the same applies to someone who was punished with death: They would give him a sleeping potion to avoid the pain of death, as stated in Sanhedrin 43a. The Gentile doctors knew nothing of this till about 200 years ago, and Roman doctors would hit the patient’s head with a hammer before performing an operation to prevent the pain, but Jewish doctors knew 2,000 years ago to use a sleeping potion.” At any rate, in the Yad Chanoch’s opinion, such chicks are like a nefel (stillborn) that never developed properly, and are therefore considered neivelah and forbidden by the Torah. (See Imrei Yosher, ibid., where Rabbi Arik rejects this opinion).Fowl Today
Virtually all the fowl that we eat today are incubator-hatched. In our era, the methods have improved for warming eggs in an incubator, and there is no difference between such fowl and those raised naturally.
