Q b.a.q. wrote:
As-Salâmu 3alaykum wa ra7matulLâhi.
I have heard that in the hanbaliyya eggs and milk had to be “halal” and so that we couldn’t eat eggs, drink milk nor eat chicken and so on… from animals that are called “jalallah”: those who receive some impurities in their food.
I am wondering how to consider it in our days when it became very hard to find something strictly pure… ?
Is this interdiction absolute ?
Jazakum AlLâhu khayran.
Wa-s-Salâmu 3alaykum.
A wa ‘alaykum al-salam wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuhu
An animal falls under the category of jalalah if the majority of its feed is filth. It is unlawful to eat the meat, eggs, or milk of such an animal until it has been first fed a diet of pure food for three days.
Some may find the ruling for jalalah in the Shafi‘i school more applicable. There it is offensive to use the meat, milk, or eggs of an animal which has consumed enough filth to bring about a change in its meat. It remains offensive until the change goes away by either changing the animal’s feed or leaving it without food.
As more and more chemicals make it into the food we consume, it is necessary to keep in mind that something could be pure yet unlawful to consume because it has been proven to be harmful. While it may be difficult to find food products that are both pure and wholesome, much of the food we eat ends up being non-essential (like meat). Perhaps the existence of organic Kosher alternatives at the supermarket will prompt our brothers and sisters to address this community-wide need.
And Allah knows best.
wa-s-salam,
mf
Concerning the observation in the trackbacks that ‘[t]his is bad science (my emphasis): “As more and more chemicals make it into the food we consume” … All food, organic or not, is made up of chemicals’: it would be better to attribute it to careless expression since it concerns the addition of things foreign to the animal̀’s typical diet whether it be animal protein as alluded to in the mustafti‘s question or growth hormones and antibiotics.