LEV79 Do not eat “cheilev.” “Cheilev”--certain fats of kosher animals--may not be eaten. A person's body is meant to serve his soul. The human soul is able to act only with the help of the body that clothes it. To the extent that the body is healthy and functions properly, the person will be able to understand the wisdom within him and will be drawn after it. Therefore, one needs to try to keep one's body healthy and strong. It is known that good health requires good and nutritious foods, and bad food is harmful to health. Out of His great kindness, Hashem in His Torah distances us from every food that is harmful to our bodies. Cheilev is forbidden because it gives rise to noxious liquids in the body. Any food forbidden by the Torah is in some way harmful to us, whether we are aware of the hazard or not. Such is the simple reason for the Torah’s forbidding us anything that might be used as food.

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LEV81 The most obvious manner (to the outside world) that an observant Jew shows the moral aspect of what he eats is his choosing not to eat certain foods based on the Torah's laws about kashrut. Just the desire to keep these laws shows a basic acceptance of God and His commandments. The specifics also demonstrate a certain level of morality, in that the animals eaten are also slaughtered in a kosher manner, the least painful way to kill an animal (Sefer Hachinuch, Mitzvah 451). The blood must be thoroughly drained and not eaten, because the blood represents the "soul" of the animal [this verse and Deut. 12:23]. Each of these details has an element of morality attached to it.

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LEV80 Do not eat the blood of animals or fowl. In addition to what we wrote above (Leviticus 7:23), we can suggest another reason why consumption of blood is forbidden. Besides causing physical harm to our bodies, consumption of blood promotes the negative character trait of ruthlessness. It is cruel to eat an animal's blood, for the blood is the creature’s very vitality. The Ramban writes similarly, that it is not fitting that one soul consume another. Furthermore, he writes, it is known that whatever a person ingests becomes a part of him, and if a person eats the blood of beasts he becomes coarse and animalistic, for he acquires some of their base animal nature.

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