לכם יהיה לאכלה ולכל חית השדה, Rashi comments on this line that man had been reduced to eat the same kind of food as the beasts of the field. When we find the statement in Sanhedrin 59, that the angels in heaven were purifying wine for Adam and roasting meat for him while he was sitting in the garden (on the Sabbath), which appears to contradict the aforesaid, this refers to meat that had descended from heaven just as the manna descended from heaven for the Israelites in the desert. When G-d had told man that they would rule over the fish in the sea, etc.; this did not mean that he was allowed to eat them, but that they were to perform work on his behalf, as pointed out on the same folio in the Talmud. The Talmud explains that even birds could be trained to perform menial tasks for man. ובכל החיה הרומשת על הארץ, “and to all the living creatures that creep on the earth.” This is a reference to the serpent alluded to in verse 28. It can serve man as carrier of messages as spelled out in Sanhedrin 59.

לכם יהיה לאכלה, only the ones mentioned in this verse. Permission to eat meat would be granted only after the deluge, and we are not sure of the reason for this. Perhaps the reason is that G’d had already foreseen that during the generation of the deluge Noach would be the one who would be directly instrumental in saving the animals, and permission to eat meat became part of Noach’s reward for his labour feeding all the animals in the ark for a full year. Seeing that G’d does not withhold reward from any creature, He would certainly not withhold it from human beings when warranted. We have a parallel example of Nevuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, being rewarded by G’d for a good deed (Ezekiel 29,18) as a result of which G’d told the prophet that He would reward him by making him victorious over the leading military might in his day, over Egypt.

Fruit of the tree (pri etz): There are two [places this appears] according to the tradition: [here, where it states,] that has within it the fruit of the tree;" [and] "fruit of a beautiful tree" (pri etz hadar) [in Leviticus 23:40]. This is a hint for the opinion that holds that the tree that Adam ate from here was a citron (etrog) [since that is what the verse in Leviticus refers to].

And God said to them, "behold I have given you, etc.": The structure of the verse is in the following way: Given that He already stated, "and fill the earth and conquer it and have dominion, etc,." by which He made man master and governor over all the creation, now He came to state the benefit of the giving, which is the eating; and with this He permitted them to eat from the plants. And from the derivation of the matter, you know that that which [God] gave them the fish of the sea and the birds of the skies and the animals is only to rule over them, not to eat them; since He specified one of the ruled [creatures] that it should be for eating, not all of them.

נתתי לכם את כל, “I have allocated it all to you in a similar manner.” The reason why G-d permitted eating living creatures after they had been killed, was that all of them had to thank man for having kept them from perishing during the deluge. As a result, all the animals were now totally at the mercy of man.

כירק עשב, “as if it were green grass.” Such grass had been permitted for man to eat ever since his creation. Just as some grass had never been fit to eat,though not forbidden,so some living creatures as well as fish and fowl would be permitted as food, whereas others would not because they are not suitable as such.

כל רמש אשר הוא חי, Any moving thing which is alive, etc. We need to understand why meat had not been permitted as food to Adam whereas now G'd permitted Noach to enjoy a meat diet. There may have been three reasons why Noach was permitted to eat meat. 1) His care for the animals during a whole year in the ark kept the whole species alive. 2) He expended a great deal of tender care on these animals. It is with regard to this that the Psalmist 128,2 says: יגיע כפיך כי תאכל אשריך וטוב לך. "When you eat what you have laboured for with your hands, you will be happy and well off." 3) G'd was in a favourable frame of mind having promised not to destroy all flesh. Hence He permitted Noach to eat of the fruit of his labours.

“I did not permit... The reason why Noach was permitted to eat meat, while Adam was not, seems to be as follows: Previously, men and animals were equal in that they all were Hashem’s creations. He formed them all from the earth; none had higher status than the other [as regards their bodies]. Why should one kill the other? But when they sinned, all should have been destroyed, and they survived only in Noach’s merit. This gave Noach a higher status than the animals. (Kitzur Mizrachi) Scripture connected the permission to eat meat to that of eating vegetables so we will not say that meat is now permitted instead of vegetables, and vegetables are no longer permitted. Thus Scripture tells us that eating meat is in addition to eating vegetables. (Divrei Dovid)

בשר בנפשו FLESH WITH THE SOUL THEREOF [SHALL YE NOT EAT] — He here prohibited to them אבר מן החי the eating of a limb cut from a living animal, that is to say that בשר בנפשו (literally, flesh together with its life) means so long as its life is in it you shall not eat the flesh.

(3) ויאכלו, “they ate;” according to the Talmud, which says the angels had been told by G-d to behave on earth as do the earthlings, we may understand this literally. According to the aggadah, they pretended to eat in order to make Avraham feel that he had fulfilled the virtue of being hospitable. Concerning the first interpretation, G-d is supposed to have criticised the angels that even babies are more discriminating than they, as babies who have been circumcised refrain from eating meat (cooked) with milk. (Based on Pessikta rabbati at the end of this Parshah.)

(1) על כן לא יאכלו, as a reminder of the heroism displayed by Yaakov, as well as a reminder of the miracle that G’d performed for him as a result of which he did not die.

(13) We may also interpret the words קדושים תהיו by emphasizing the future tense, i.e. תהיו, "you shall become holy." The implication is that this is a commandment which is an ongoing process. The Torah asks us to eat מצה on Passover, to sit in huts on סוכות, to abstain from certain kinds of activities on the Sabbath, etc. The common denominator of all those commandments is that they apply on certain days or on certain dates only. Not so the commandment of "be holy." This commandment applies day in day out throughout our lifetime. The imperative to strive for sanctity is one that we cannot take a vacation from. Even while we are busy performing this commandment it is one that we never have mastered completely. Whatever sanctity we attain is superior to what we had achieved previously but inferior to what we still hope to achieve. We know from our prophets that they too possessed sanctity in varying degrees, Moses having achieved the relatively highest level of sanctity. Nonetheless it is entirely possible that one can achieve even greater heights of sanctity than the level attained by Moses. The level of sanctity that will have been achieved by the Messiah when he reveals himself will prove to be even superior to that of Moses. We know this from Isaiah 11,2 in which the attributes of the Messiah are described. They include: "The spirit of the Lord shall descend upon him, a spirit of wisdom and insight, etc. etc." If we accept the words of Bamidbar Rabbah 19 and Devarim Rabbah chapter 2 that Moses himself will be the Messiah, this is further proof that there is no upper limit to the "holiness" described here by the Torah. The Torah writes תהיו in order to remind us that the ultimate realisation of the ideal of holiness will forever remain "in the future." (14) The Torah supplies the reason for this with the words "for I the Lord your G'd am holy." G'd implies that just as there is no limit to His holiness, so our striving for holiness must remain something that has no upper limit. G'd desires that His favourite creatures engage in an ongoing process of becoming more and more like their father in Heaven.