INTERESTING!
I recently gave this shiur, talking about the question of what to eat when faced with a choice of human flesh or unkosher food [Hashem save us from such a fate!!].
I just saw this:
Rav Yaakov Kaminetzky asked - why is Avimelech criticized for not asking a guest if he needs food or drink and for instead inquiring about the woman with him. That is not one of the Sheva Mitzvos Bnei Noach, it doesn't violate anything. As a matter of fact, regarding Sedom the Posuk says in Yechezkel that Sedom was criticized because they didn't practice Tzedaka. Tzedaka is not one of the Sheva Mitzvos Bnei Noach. Why are the Bnei Noach punished for this?
Rav Yaakov there says an amazing Yesod. He says that the Bnei Noach are obligated in Dinim. Simply put, Dinim means to have a set of laws. Rav Yaakov says the idea of Dinim is more than that. Hashem created human beings with a certain sense of values, a certain sense of Yashrus. He writes there Mentchlichkeit. The idea of Mentchlichkeit is not a separate Chiyuv in the Torah. But they are all part of Dinim, they are part of the Dinim that we are obligated in and from there we get the understanding for a number of practices which you can say Vu Shtait (where does it say this)? Du Shtait, it says it in the heart of a Yid the ideas of Yashrus, of values that are universal among all human beings. That sense of values is part of Dinim. This is Rav Yaakov's Yesod.
Then Rav Yaakov adds something that is a tremendous Chiddush. He says if you have a Choleh She'yaish Bo Sakana, somebody must have meat because it is a Sakana for him, and he has a choice he can either eat Basar Nevaila which is an Issur Lav. Or he has available to him Cheilev which is an Issur Kareis. Or Basar Adam, human flesh. Human flesh according to the Rashba is not prohibited by any Issur in the Torah. According to the Rambam it is an Issur Asei. By the law, eating human flesh is certainly less strict than eating Cheilev which is punishable by Kareis. So if a Choleh has a choice between the two which one should he eat? In the footnote in this piece from Rav Yaakov, they bring that this speech took place in 1973 when there was a plane crash in the Andes Mountains (which took place on Friday October 13, 1972). It took many weeks until the survivors were found. The survivors had to survive by resorting to cannibalism by eating the flesh of others who had died in the crash. Rav Yaakov was disturbed because somebody had said at that time that the Torah according to the Rashba doesn't even prohibit the consumption of human flesh. This disturbed Rav Yaakov. Although B'makom Sakana certainly a person is allowed, but Rav Yaakov made the point that eating Basar Adam is something which goes against the grain, against the sense of Yashrus of every human being. Therefore, it is part of Dinim not to eat it. Rav Yaakov writes B'lashon Bit'mi'a. If a Choleh She'yaish Bo Sakana has a choice to eat Cheilev, or Nevaila, or Treifa or Basar Adam, even according to the Rashba that Basar Adam is not Treif in the sense of Ma'achalos Asuros, Rav Yaakov says certainly a person should better eat the Nevailah, Treifah, or even the Cheilev because it goes against the sense of Yashrus of human beings.
That is a tremendous Chiddush and a bit of a dangerous Chiddush. People can hear this Drasha and then go say my sense of Yashrus says to violate Issurim of the Torah Chas V'shalom. It has to be used right. The idea, the sense, this is a Chiddush of Rav Yaakov which is something not meant to be a Kulah, it is meant to be a Chumra. To tell people that certain items with a certain sense of value and you say Vu Shtait, where does it state that you have to do it? It is a universally accepted idea that human beings with a sense of Yashrus in certain areas and that is binding.
