Prohibition against slaughtering an animal and its offspring on the same day

Hebrew Bible

The commandment originates from a verse in the book of Leviticus that states:

But you shall not slaughter, from the herd or the flock, an animal with its young on the same day.

The commandment is preceded by the instruction that a calf or lamb is only acceptable for sacrifice on the eighth day (22:26). The Hebrew Bible uses the generic word for bull or cow (Hebrew: שור showr), and the generic word for sheep and ewe (שה seh) and the masculine pronoun form in the verb "slaughter-him" (Hebrew shachat-u)

Second Temple period

The earliest Jewish commentary on this commandment is found in the Temple Scroll among the Dead Sea scrolls:

And an ox or a lamb with its offspring you may not slaughter at the same time. And you shall not strike the mother with her offspring.

The interpretation of the Dead Sea scrolls differs from later rabbinical Judaism in prohibiting the slaughter of a pregnant animal.

In the Septuagint of Hellenistic Judaism the passage was translated with moschos - the generic Greek word for bull or cow or calf.

Rabbinical interpretation

Some Chazalic scholars interpret "the same day" not as meaning a 24-hour period, but as the same calendar day.

Obadiah ben Abraham of Bertinoro in his commentary on the Mishnah (1549, on Chullin 5:1 et al.) understood the prohibition to apply to both mother or father of the offspring. According to Hezekiah ben Manoah's commentary on Leviticus (1524) Rashi was of the opinion that the prohibition applies to a male ox alone, but that Rashi would also have agreed that it is likewise a prohibition - albeit of a rabbinic degree of lesser stringency - to slaughter a female cow with her offspring.