Q. I’m a biologist and medical technician involved in medical research, and in the common daily work we do, we put in danger and terminate different animals as rabbits and mice. I often feel really bad for them and their suffering, especially when so many doubts are involved in their true help. What is the correct thing to do my Dear Rabbi?
A. On question 186 regarding if there are any halacha issues when destroying/removing a bird’s nest that has appeared in a light fixture outside one’s home. We wrote:
“The Talmud (Baba Metzia 32a,b) quotes opinions if Tzaar Baaley Chaim or the affliction caused to animals is a biblical or a rabbinical prohibition. Most Poiskim agree that it is a biblical proscription (Shulchan Aruch CH.M. 272:9 –- see Sdei Chemed, letter tzadik 1, for a comprehensive list of opinions).
However, it is permitted to use animals for one’s convenience, as needed. Trumas Hadeshen (Psokim 105) derives this from the saying in the Talmud (Kidushin 82a) that animals “were created for my (human) use” and from the fact that we encounter in the Torah, their widespread employment, as in riding and working with them. Chasam Sofer (Baba Metzia ibid.) mentions, as a source for this consent, the verse: “and rule over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the sky and over all the beast.” (Bereshit 1:28).
Horav Shlomo Miller’s Shlit”a opinion is, that if a bird’s nest became a nuisance and a source of inconvenience, their removal is permitted. Yet care should be taken to do so in a gentle and considerate way.”
Shebbus Yaakov (3: 81) quotes Maasas Binyomin and many other responses that it is permitted.
As Remah (E. H. 5: 14) rules that any animal intervention needed for human healing is permitted, even when in doubt of their success.
Yet one must constantly remember the Talmud teaching, (Baba Metzia 85,a) regarding an episode of Rebbi’s life, that offers the following advice: “One who shows compassion for living things, attains also compassion from Heaven”
Rabbi A. Bartfeld as revised by, Horav Dovid Pam, Horav Aharon Miller, Horav Chanoch Ehrentreu and Horav Kalman Ochs Shlit'a
Important Numbers
