Perhaps I am a little late in adding my comments to this post? I just wanted to tell you that your interpretation of the injunction against cooking a kid in its mother's milk is actually spot on: the prohibition is specifically against *cooking* them together and, no, there is nothing wrong with cold cuts. The Rabbis, however, sought to apply certain stringencies to the Torah's laws - referred to as putting a 'fence' around the Torah (see, for example, Piqei Aboth 1:1). As this particular law is mentioned in the Torah on three separate occasions, the Rabbis applied three specific stringencies to it.
1) It is impermissable to cook meat and dairy together; 2) It is impermissable to eat meat and dairy together (irrespective of whether or not they have been cooked together); 3) It is impermissable to gain ANY benefit from the combination of meat and dairy (eg: selling it, cooked or uncooked, to a non-Jew).
These laws only relate to kosher meat and kosher dairy (although not all authorities even agree on whether or not dairy can be non-kosher), even though the Torah itself never specified this particular 'leniency'. For evidence that the Torah's laws only related to the cooking of these objects together and not just their consumption, take a look at what Abraham feeds his three visitors in Genesis 18:7-8!
(Later commentators have justified this, incidentally, by arguing that the visitors were angels - for which there may be evidence within the narrative itself. It is also pertinent to consider the possibility that the author/s of Genesis rejected the notion of law)
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timeasmymeasure
Some Torah observations from an irreligious Jew:
Date: 2006-06-26 08:05 am (UTC)1) It is impermissable to cook meat and dairy together;
2) It is impermissable to eat meat and dairy together (irrespective of whether or not they have been cooked together);
3) It is impermissable to gain ANY benefit from the combination of meat and dairy (eg: selling it, cooked or uncooked, to a non-Jew).
These laws only relate to kosher meat and kosher dairy (although not all authorities even agree on whether or not dairy can be non-kosher), even though the Torah itself never specified this particular 'leniency'. For evidence that the Torah's laws only related to the cooking of these objects together and not just their consumption, take a look at what Abraham feeds his three visitors in Genesis 18:7-8!
(Later commentators have justified this, incidentally, by arguing that the visitors were angels - for which there may be evidence within the narrative itself. It is also pertinent to consider the possibility that the author/s of Genesis rejected the notion of law)