Sacred and unclean animals

[zebo-the-fat]

In ancient Egypt pigs were considered as sacred
In Karnataka, India Serpent deities are worshiped
In Hinduism cattle’s are considered to be holy
In Islam and Judaism the pig is considered unclean
Who decides these things, if a new animal was discovered in the deepest Amazonian forests, who would decide if was just another animal, sacred or unclean, what tests would be used to decide this?

[ignoramus]

Historically, I'd say the decision was a political/financial one. (Aren't they all?)

(If any new species of animals were found in the deepest Amazonian forests, I don't think religios are going to bother with it at all as it will be a rare and endangered species to start with.)

[Minimalist]

Who decides these things

Men wearing stupid hats.

[chimp3]

I consider the vagina sacred but that never stopped me from eating it.

[brewer]

I worship camel toes.

[Brian37]

In ancient Egypt pigs were considered as sacred
In Karnataka, India Serpent deities are worshiped
In Hinduism cattle’s are considered to be holy
In Islam and Judaism the pig is considered unclean
Who decides these things, if a new animal was discovered in the deepest Amazonian forests, who would decide if was just another animal, sacred or unclean, what tests would be used to decide this?

Since it isn't scientific, I'd say the person or people who started those myths in antiquity decided and successfully sold those myths.

I would say however, those gap filling avoiding certain animals might have resulted in seeing people get sick from not fully cooking certain animal meat and had no clue what bacteria or toxins were. They might have come to the false conclusion that the animal had magic powers over their lives and thus exalted the animal as being something to protect. 

But just like holy clothing it is simply another superstition humans make up and buy and sell as a form of gap filling.

There are real health reasons you avoid certain foods and why you cook raw meat. But no, neither pigs or cows have any magic ability to affect where you go in an after life that does not exist.

[Chad32]

I agree that animals being considered clean was likely due to the ruling class liking those animals for whatever reason, and considering something unclean is likely because of illness due to poorly cooking the meat, or because the animal behaved in a manner that Humans would consider bad, or whatever. A common way for animals to keep bugs off of them is rolling around in the dirt, or staying cool by dipping themselves in mud, but all the Humans could see was the animal being very dirty and unappealing.

[brewer]

I consider the vagina sacred but that never stopped me from eating it.

SIN EATER!!!!!

[Astonished]

In some cases it was said to be that unclean animals resembled the demonic/devilish entities of whatever flavor of faith was infecting that area.

But I have another hypothesis about that, which also has to do with my hypothesis about why there are prohibitions against homosexuality in the bible; some shepherd with a lot of land was expecting a tidy dowry, and then his son ran off with a stable boy instead of going through with the marriage, so he lost out on the chance to expand. So he bitched about it to a friend who happened to be one of the holy order, and wham bam thank you ma'am, buttfucking becomes an abomination. Substitute stable boy for farm animal of your choice, and you get unclean animals. Also very likely one of these assholes trod on a sea urchin and said the same thing about anything in the water that wasn't a fish being an abomination afterward.

[Chad32]

Yes, they used Pan, a satyr god, as a template for what Satan looks like, and suddenly goats are bad. And I guess it does suck pretty hard when your first born son would rather chase boys around than marry a girl that the parents could profit from. That could be one explanation for why homosexuality is considered so bad. You need kids so you can get more boys into the military, and girls to form marriage alliances, and homosexuality just screws things up.