NOTES for Exo 34:26
The prohibition against boiling a young goat in its mother's milk became the basis for many norms of kashrut in Judaism, in particular those connected with the ban on mixing meat dishes with dairy. Yet the point here is not meat and not milk. This is indicated, among other things, by the very form of the corresponding legal norm: on the one hand, it mentions the need to consecrate the first fruits, and on the other, that same young goat boiled in its mother's milk. At first glance, these are things with no connection to one another.
In reality there is a connection, though it is not so obvious. The point is that, judging by the data that have reached us concerning the religious practice of a number of Near Eastern peoples, including the Jews' closest neighbors, a young goat boiled in goat's milk was a ritual dish, probably connected with the cult of the Great Goddess, patroness of fertility and childbirth, whose cult was widespread throughout the Near East. She was worshiped in the cities of Galilee, in Judea, and in the Samaritan steppe, and she was worshiped long before Abraham migrated to Palestine.
After the Jews conquered the land promised to them by God, the cult of the Great Goddess spread rather widely among them. As is known, paganism flourished luxuriantly among the people of God, provoking the denunciations of the prophets, who saw the greatest threat to Yahwism precisely in "the Astartes and the Baals." But the Great Goddess, that same "Astarte," did not attract the attention of the recent nomads by accident: they wanted to receive support from above and a blessing for their new settled, agricultural life, and it seemed to many that Yahweh would be no help here, since He was the God of the wilderness and the steppe, the God of nomads, not of settled farmers.
And so in the Torah there appear at the same time a ban on participating in the cult of the Great Goddess and a requirement to dedicate the first fruits to God, to that same Yahweh who, as it turns out, will support His people not only in the wilderness and the steppe, but also in the field, in the garden, and in the vineyard. If, of course, the people themselves want this. And if, with their needs, they turn not to "the Astartes and the Baals," but to the God who not only brought them out of Egypt and led them through the wilderness, but also brought them to that land where, of course, He will not leave them without help and support.