Kashruth Endangered

Many a bimah (pulpit) of New York synagogs vibrated with Rabbinical wrath last Friday evening. The Kashruth Association, guild of ritual food inspectors, met during the week in anger. Some 6,500 kosher butcher shops feared for their supplies. Half as many kosher delicatessen stores were worried about their spicy provender; householders in The Bronx, Manhattan, Queens and Brooklyn chirped excitedly. All because of horrid disclosures of racketeering in the city's kosher food markets (see p. 15). The Kashruth Association called conditions in the kosher chicken markets "a blot upon the good name of the Jew." The Kashruth Association could no longer, it announced, stand responsible for the ritual cleanliness of the delicatessen stores. A treasured necessity of Judaism was in danger. Kosher, Trefah, Parve. The Bible outlines, the Talmud interprets, and Qaro's Shulchan Arnch (Table Prepared) codi- fies, or as Jews say "puts a fence around," the Jewish dietary laws. These inflexible laws have been a major factor in keeping Jews socially cohesive during the centuries. The laws, however, have their sensible loopholes. In a case of life-or-death, a Jew may eat anything. But no good Jew considers racketeering or carelessness a necessity. Healthiness of flesh is the basis of kashruth. Animals must have cloven hoofs and chew the cud (but no cud-chewing camels, no split-hoof swine). Fish must have both fins and scales (no sharks, no catfish, no shellfish). Birds must not prey. No creature that "goeth upon the belly" is kosher. Nor is one that dies a natural death (disease might have caused death). Because the Torah reads, "Thou shalt not seethe a kid in its mother's milk," kashruth separates meat and milk dishes. Anything cooked with animal fats is "meaty"; anything in butter or milk is "milky." Milky and meaty may not be served at the same meal. The housewife must keep two complete sets of dishes and utensils. Salting (melihah) of meat to remove all blood is a final koshering rite. The rabbis, however, allow for "neutral," or parve foods--vegetables, grain products, fish, eggs. Neutral dishes may be prepared as meaty or milky. An illegitimate mixture of foods is tre- fah or terephah. Terephah literally means "an animal torn by wild beasts." It applies especially to the slaughter of animals, or shechitah. Shechitah. The shochet is the one who does the slaughtering. One may not be a shochet if he is a deaf-mute, idiot, minor, one who is intoxicated, an old man with trembling hands (he might press against the throat instead of having his knife go gently forwards & backwards), a non-Jew, or a Jew who spitefully transgresses the laws. The shochet is a man of Hebrew learning, well-versed in Talmud and the laws. His is an honorable profession. He takes a rigid examination before competent authority in all the laws of shechitah and trefah. The length of the shochet's knife must be twice the width of the throat to be cut, must be razor-sharp and unnicked. Before slaughtering, the shochet carefully says: "Blessed are Thou . . . who sanctified us with His commandments and commanded us concerning slaughtering." If many animals are being killed at the same time, one blessing is enough. After the blessing, there should be no irrelevant conversation.

The process of slaughtering requires the shochet to cut through the windpipe and gullet in mammals; through either of these in birds. If the greater part of both organs is cut through (or in birds, the greater part of either), that is well. In birds, the veins along both sides of the neck must be pierced at the time of slaughtering.

The rabbis have summarized the following details for the process:

1) Shechiyah (delay). There should be none. The knife stroke should be continuous, backward & forward, until the organs are cut through. If there is one moment delay, then the animal is unfit.

2) Derasah (pressing). The movement should be gentle, without undue exertion. One may not lay a finger on the blade while slaughtering.

3) Haladah (digging). Draw the knife over the throat. If it is placed between the windpipe and gullet, or under a cloth over the neck, so that any part of the knife is invisible, the animal is unfit.

4) Hagramah (slipping). The limits within which the knife may be inserted are from the large ring in the windpipe to the top of the upper lobe of the lungs when inflated. If the knife is inserted any part above or below, the animal is unfit.

5) Ikkur (tearing). The animal is unfit if either windpipe or gullet is torn out or removed from its regular position during the slaughtering. After slaughter the shochet examines the animal's throat and ascertains whether windpipe and gullet are cut through according to the laws' re- quirements.

One must not kill the mother and young on the same day. If the paternity of the animal is known, this law applies also to the father and his young. If this rule is broken, the animal is still fit. But the transgressor is to be punished. The regulations for slaughter (sharp knife, drawing motion, not pressing, etc.) are for lessening pain, preventing cruelty to the creature. The anti-cruelty attitude rules out hunting.

Shochtim slaughter practically all kine in New York City. Jews consume the kosher forequarters, gentiles (goyim) the hindquarters which are difficult to kosher. Laws of some states require that anything marked kosher be kosher. Meats carry a stamped date and a lead seal (blumba) affixed by a Rabbinical inspector. All meat products must carry a blumba. Mashgichim (inspectors) continually go through the community inspecting butcher shops, delicatessen stores and factories for meat cheats. The Hebrew letters Beth and Kaf which initial the phrase baser kosher (clean flesh) on honest Jewish stores, look very much alike. Hence scamps sometimes label their stores boser boscr.

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