2655. The method of slaughtering an animal is that the esophagus which is the food pipe, and the trachea which is the airway, and the two veins which are next to the trachea (commonly known as the four arteries), should be severed completely from below the laryngeal prominence (the protrusion below the throat). It will not be sufficient to simply cause an incision in them.
2656. If a person cuts some of the four arteries, then waits for the animal to die, and thereafter severs the remaining arteries, that animal will not become §¡hir or lawful to consume. The same will apply based on obligatory precaution if the four pathways are all slaughtered prior to its death, but they are not severed in the normal consecutive manner.
2657. If a wolf tears apart a section of a sheep’s neck, but leaves the four pathways intact, or tears apart another part of the sheep’s body, then in the event that the sheep is still alive, and it is slaughtered in the manner that will be elaborated, it becomes §¡hir and lawful to consume. However, if the wolf tears apart the neck in a manner that the four pathways that are in the neck, and which must be severed, are completely destroyed, then that sheep will become unlawful. However, if it tears apart some of the pathways in a manner that it would be possible to sever it a little above or a little below, then it is problematic to claim that the animal is lawful to consume.
