Milk: Symbol of Sivan

Exploring the connection between dairy and the Jewish month of Sivan

Photo by Elizabeth Dunne on Unsplash

It is a Jewish custom to eat dairy on Shavuot, which begins the first week of Sivan.  So let’s explore dairy for the month of Sivan.

Let’s start with the separation of milk and meat in the Torah.  What it actually says is “don’t boil a kid in its mother’s milk” (לֹא-תְבַשֵּׁל גְּדִי, בַּחֲלֵב אִמּוֹ). This prohibition is found three times in the Torah: Exodus 23:19,  Exodus 34: 26 and Deuteronomy 14:21, which means — seriously, don’t freaking do this we’re not kidding around!!!   

Most likely this was a prohibition on mixing life and death; milk being the source of life and death being meat, very literally in this case the meat of the kid goat. It was also, according to the Encyclopeida of Jewish Symbols, a common ancient pagan practice to give an offering of a kid boiled it it’s mother’s milk as part of religoius rites.  This is also a good reason that it was prohibited in ancient Jewish practice. Like so many things in Jewish tradition walls upon walls were built up to ensure we don’t accidentally make this mistake.