[Avodah] torture in halacha???

[Zev Sero]

On 14/05/2012 4:00 PM, Micha Berger wrote:
> On Mon, May 14, 2012 at 02:01:18PM -0500, Lisa Liel wrote:
>> On 5/13/2012 3:26 PM, Harvey Benton wrote:

>>> is torture ever allowed in halacha???

>> Is it ever not allowed in halakha?

> If tza'ar baalei chaim isn't allowed, lo kol shekein humans.
> So, there has to be a criterion for justification.

If it's for no reason then why talk about torture?  Hitting another
person is explicitly forbidden by the Torah: "pen yosif".  The question
only makes sense in a case where we've already determined that hitting
is permitted, and now RHB is asking whether there are any cases where
not only hitting but also torture is permitted.  And RLL's response is
correct: first find a case where it's *not* permitted, and only then
can you ask whether there also exist cases where it is.

-- 
Zev Sero        "Natural resources are not finite in any meaningful
zev at sero.name    economic sense, mind-boggling though this assertion
                  may be. The stocks of them are not fixed but rather
		 are expanding through human ingenuity."
		                            - Julian Simon