[Avodah] Abiogenesis

[Richard Wolberg]

What I find most interesting is that the Gemara believed in  
spontaneous generation which has been scientifically disproven as the  
world was proven not to be flat. What I find to be ironic and  
paradoxical is that only God can create something from nothing. You  
would think this would have occurred to the great minds of the Talmud.  
True, their argument could conceivably have been that God put that law  
into motion, but it still could have raised a red flag.


The following came from a link given in a previous discussion by Reb  
Micha: http://www.aishdas.org/book/bookA.pdf

My Rebbe, R. Dovid Lifshitz zt"l, used a similar idea to explain a  
different
problem. The Gemara explains that maggots found within a piece of meat  
are kosher.
The reason given is that they were born from the meat, an idea known  
in the history of
science as "spontaneous generation". Therefore, halachah treats the  
maggots identically to
the meat.
Spontaneous generation has since been disproven. Maggots come from
microscopic eggs, not abiogenetically from the meat. Now that we know  
that the
underlying science is wrong, need we conclude that the halachic ruling  
is also wrong?
Rav Dovid taught that the halachic ruling is still applicable, because  
the
microscopic eggs and maggot larvae are not visible, and therefore  
(like the insects in our
first example), lack mamashus. The only cause for the current presence  
of maggots that
we can see is the meat.
Viewing the question in terms of human experience, the meat is the  
only source of
the maggots. Bugs or eggs that are too small to be seen, while we  
might cerebrally know
they are there, can’t have the existential impact as those I could,  
and ought to have,
noticed unaided.


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