ABSTRACT
The history of Jewish eating practices must begin with the ancient biblical laws pertaining to permitted and prohibited foods. Technically speaking, of course, the Torah’s eating laws are not, in their origin, “Jewish.” The name “Jewish,” or even “Judahite,” did not identify the people of the bible until the return from the Babylonian exile (sixth-fi fth century BCE). But these people-ancient Israel-were the ancestors of the people who would later be known as Jews, and, more importantly, their eating laws would regulate the eating practices of Jews for all centuries to come. It is thus unimaginable to begin this history anywhere else.
