Kashrut: Fact, Fiction and In Between part 1

In 2002, shortly after my return to the States, I attended a lecture hosted by the Long Island Board of Rabbis. The speaker was a rabbi who publishes a Kashrut magazine. He waxed eloquent about the pitfalls of buying bread at a bakery without rabbinic supervision., He went through a number of "horror stories", about terrible violations that can occur. Now, he is right about that. Many ingredients in baked goods can be problematic, or downright forbidden. (E.g,. lard). But he wasn't talking about those things. He was trying to show esoteric problems that would occur to no one. In the end, he asked for questions. I said "Excuse me, but every one of your examples is, from the standpoint of the Shulchan Aruch, actually kosher". He let out a frustrated whispered remark "I didn't think anyone here would be Orthodox" (i.e., knowledgeable in halachah). He then said "speak to me when everyone leaves". I did. He said to me "Where are you rabbi?" I answered "Island Park". He said "the people of Island Park didn't hire you to tell them that things are kosher. .They hired you to tell them that things are not kosher". He was wrong. The vast majority of my congregants didn't keep kosher at all. A handful kept a kosher home, but would eat nonkosher outside. One had even told me "my wife and I would really like to take you and Sima out to a nice restaurant, but can't because of the 'kosher business'".I immediately realized, however, that what this rabbi was really saying, is that "although kashrut is fairly simple (until we get into questions such as what to do when dairy accidentally falls into meat), we must make it hard, so as to disempower the consumer, making him dependent on a billion-dollar kashrut industry..not to mention my paranoid magazine". Kashrut covers many areas. Some are Biblical law, some are rabbinic enactments. Some are "decrees" designed to prevent intermarriage. A few are health tips, based on the medical knowledge of a bygone era. Some commonly observed ones are actually folklore, still kept even though denounced by all rabbis. The Torah does not give a reason for Kashrut. But the words "sanctify yourselves" occur frequently in the context of kashrut. The reason may therefore be surmised that the vast majority of these rules are not in place for health reasons (although we are commanded to guard our health), but for holiness. The Torah has laws that sanctify every area of life. Eating is no exception. In this series, I hope to outline the major areas of kashrut. I will explain the basic laws and how to apply them (not difficult!), when a rabbi must be consulted, different practices of different communities and their different concerns, as well as pointing out folklore, or pure fiction, fed to a gullible public in order to bring more revenue to the coffers of supervising agencies. Hold tight for the ride.