Why Does God Allow Animal Exploitation? With Rabbi Akiva Gersh | Ep. 77

In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves - these words spoken by Carl Sagan and were inspired by "The Pale Blue Dot" a picture of Earth taken by the Voyager 1 space probe from a distance of 6 billion kilometers (3.7 billion miles).

In the spirit of that insight, I asked today's guest, Rabbi Akiva Gersh, also known as the Vegan Rabbi, "Why does God not intervene to stop the horrors of animal exploitation?" That kicked off a fascinating conversation about religion and its place in the vegan movement, the nature of evil, antisemitism and why does Rabbi Akiva think that the fight for animal rights is.... a holy fight.

I am full of admiration of Rabbi Akiva's tireless work of using religious arguments to promote compassion for animals in the Jewish community.