My newest book Taming the Beast: Human-Animal Encounters in the Bible (Wipf and Stock Publishers) addresses a surprisingly under-explored and little discussed topic; it explores the relationship between humans and animals through biblical and Rabbinic lenses, and approaches familiar narratives from a completely fresh perspective.  The following is not an author’s personal review – only a report about the book’s main themes.                                                                                                                                          ***                                                                                                                                                I was drawn to this biblical Anthro-zoological subject in response to the common instinctive human reactions to human-perpetrated atrocities by calling them (or those who carried them out) the likes of “human bestiality”, “predatory animals”, and “human animals”.

This despite the fact that predatory animals – in contrast to humans – do not engage in mass ravening of lives lacking the energy, motives, let alone the tools, that humans who commit acts of utter cruelty and devastation have. The Torah does not prohibit us from behaving like predatory animals because there are no examples of such animals wolfing en masse on humans, unless doing God’s (rare!) bidding.

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