משפטים, kashrut, and tzitzit

I decided that watching the State of the Union last night would only piss me off, so instead I read the Torah portion for this week, משפטים (Mishpatim). And I noticed something interesting for the first time. As I mentioned in a previous post, we many times get stuck on early verses, or at other points and don't get through the entire portion. In משפטים I think we usually get caught up in the section about a fight that results in a woman's miscarriage. Last night I got through the entire parashah, including the following:

23:19 You shall not boil a kid in its mother's milk.

Now, what caught my interest last night was that this prohibition, while seemingly coming at random, follows a list of how to make sacrifices, or more specifically, what things you can or can't do or bring when making a sacrifice to God. For instance, any sacrifice that includes blood (think of all the dashing of the blood we have later in Leviticus) cannot be offered with leavened bread; you can't leave the fat of the offering lying out overnight; and you should bring the choice first fruits of your soil to God. And THEN we get the prohibition against boiling a kids in its mother's milk. So, is it not possible to extrapolate that this is in reference to offering sacrifices as well? Or conversely, the previous verses have also spoken about Shabbat, the Sabbath year, and the festivals--perhaps this prohibition referred only to those specific times.

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I understand part of the reasoning behind kashrut is that it is a way of separating our behavior from our gentile neighbors, to an extent. I think that the lengths which it has been taken to has made it incredibly difficult for many people to follow it perfectly (and as such are discouraged to even attempt to because of the difficulty). It seems to go against common sense to make this a system that so many Jews want to have nothing to do with. I'm not saying that it should be so lax that gentiles and christians adopt it, but especially in our modern world isn't it something that should be amended and revised? Strip away the fences, get back to the root of the original commandments and begin to interpret them in view of our modern understanding of food and Jewish identity. I think my problem with kashrut, at the core, is that it assumes that the wise people, the sages, no longer exist in Judaism. I realize that my views are decidedly Reform, and that's not something I'll apologize for. We have wise Jews today, modern sages, and the interpretation should continue; it shouldn't be stuck in a time that most of us cannot relate to anymore. I feel that it is my duty as a Jew to study, to interpret, and to make decisions for myself. And I love that.

That is one of the reasons I felt good about adopting the mitzvah of wearing tzitzit. I feel a connection to my personal observance, to the miztvot, to my Judaism, and to God, that I most times only feel when I am at temple or praying. I love this physical connection that I have when I wear my tallit during prayer, and I love now having it all of the time. I love that I'm not making a distinction between striving to be holy while I pray and striving to be holy in my daily life. Should my behavior not be the same in and out of shul? If I'm connecting to that part of myself, the part that strives for holiness and a connection to God while I'm at temple, then what am I doing with the rest of my time? Either I'm striving for kedusha or I'm not. And I feel that by donning my tzitzit each day I am taking a small step to make my life holier.