Why is pork forbidden but not fish?

The Holy Qur’an expressly permits the creatures of the sea and calls the flesh of swine unclean. The fact that fish eat other animals is no objection, because eating flesh is nothing shameful for an animal. What stands out about the pig is something else.

Some people ask: if the pig is forbidden partly because it eats flesh, should fish not be forbidden as well? After all, many fish eat other fish. But this line of thought misses the point.

There is nothing objectionable in an animal eating flesh. Lions, wolves and many fish are created that way. God gave them this nature, and they are not to blame for it. That is why not every animal that eats other animals is forbidden, and the first verse above expressly permits the creatures of the sea.

With the pig, something else stands out. It is not a predator, yet when one of its young or one of its own kind dies, it will often eat its flesh. Predators, which eat meat by nature, generally avoid the flesh of their own kind. This habit is unusual and unpleasant in the pig.

Such reflections should not be overstated, though. The Holy Qur’an calls the flesh of swine unclean, as the second verse above says, and does not explain further. Anything beyond that is human reflection that can help us understand the prohibition. A Muslim refrains from pork because God has ordained it, not because a particular explanation has convinced him.