The Jewish Perspective

In the Jewish faith, they follow a very specific set of dietary rules called Kashrut.  Kashrut specifies that meat and milk are to never be combined but it goes to differentiate meat and fish. In fact, not only are you to not mix meat and milk but you are also not to mix fish and meat.  This clearly demonstrates that there is a huge difference between fish and meat when looked at from the perspective of the Kashrut.  One interesting thing, however, is that the Kashrut includes poultry in the definition of meat, whereas the Merriam-Webster definition 2a excluded poultry.

Much of the Kashrut laws are derived from the book of Leviticus, but the one pertaining to fish specifically is located in Leviticus 11: 9-11:

9 ‘These you may eat of all that are in the water: whatever in the water has fins and scales, whether in the seas or in the rivers—that you may eat. 10 But all in the seas or in the rivers that do not have fins and scales, all that move in the water or any living thing which is in the water, they are an abomination to you. 11 They shall be an abomination to you; you shall not eat their flesh, but you shall regard their carcasses as an abomination. 12 Whatever in the water does not have fins or scales—that shall be an abomination to you. (NKJV)

The inclusion of poultry in the definition of meat is also contrary to another argument we will be discussing which is the argument for "White Meat."  In the perspective of Judaism and the Kashrut laws, meat and fish are two very different things.  They are so different that they cannot even be eaten together or prepared with the same utensils.