EXOD398 The Torah imposes moral obligations even toward animals. Their welfare is to be taken into consideration even when it involves an injury to the owner. Three passages in the Pentateuch specifically enjoin consideration for the welfare of animals. One is part of the fourth commandment. On the seventh day, not only are old and young, male and female, free and slave, stranger and citizen to rest, but beasts of burden may also not be worked [this verse, Deuteronomy 5:14]. Hence a Jew is not permitted to sell or hire out his animal to anyone who is known to work his animals on the Sabbath. [Avodah Zarah 14b] The Torah also commands that one shall not team an ox with the donkey when plowing [Deuteronomy 22:10]. As the human laborer is permitted to eat from the crop he was gathering, [Bava Metzia 87a-b, J.T. Ma'aserot chap. 2, halakhah 4] so is the animal [ibid, 25:4]. Animals are to be treated humanely, and their slaughter for food or Temple sacrifice is to be accomplished in a manner that inflicts the minimum of pain. The ancient Greeks and Romans had no sympathy with these laws, which involves economic sacrifices. Spinoza is of the opinion that "the law against killing animals was based upon an empty superstition and womanish tenderness, rather than upon sound wisdom." [Spinoza, Ethics, pt. 4, prop. 37, scholium, p. 209.]