Why keep kosher

What exactly do those terms mean and what are the It has always bothered me why all of the first-borns in Egypt had to suffering in that final, devastating plague. There is no mention in the verses Who was the Ethiopian Cushite wife that Moses took Numbers ? Get Our Emails. Current Issues. America's Lost Boys and Me. Henry Heimlich and Being Someone's Angel. Ten Rules for Effective Communication. A Successful Mindset for Dating. Secrets of the Cave of the Patriarchs. Dave Chappelle and the Space Jews.

Torah Portion. Remembering the Mensch of Malden Mills. I, Pencil: The Movie. The translators do their best to guess from the Hebrew, but even the use of older translations, later Hebrew, or even Aramaic, Akkadian, or Syriac are of little help.

Ordained rabbi and social justice advocate with extensive experience serving congregations and leading large-scale community change. Published author who concentrates on bringing deep Jewish understanding to the lay public. For this school of thought, God is a cosmic doctor, providing a prescription to ensure the health of the Jewish People. For this reason, God removed us from them so that the souls can do their function. This view understands kashrut as a medical plan to ensure the health of individual Jews.

God prohibited foods that were harmful, thus ensuring that Jews would be vigorous and fit. God, they tell us, was the first health-food freak, and kashrut was the macrobiotics of its time. After all, kashrut applies only to the Jews.

Another understanding of kashrut, advanced by persons interested in abandoning the dietary laws, is that kashrut was an early compensation for unsanitary conditions. My grandmother was one of the most devoted exponents of that opinion. Such a viewpoint has no basis in either science or religion.

No sacred text links the practice of the dietary laws to a fear of epidemic, or to a need to avoid rotting meat. The prohibition against meat and milk also serves to remind us where our food comes from. The meat is from a dead animal, the milk from a living animal. These are foods that have their origin in living creatures and keeping them separate makes us aware of their source.

Hence we can understand why the Torah prohibits a Jewish farmer from eating the produce of his own field until he has given tithes to those without land of their own. He is not being asked to be extra nice, he is being commanded to be just. Even the types of animals we eat are chosen in part for their symbolism. The ruminants that have split hooves tend to be tranquil, domesticated animals that have no natural weapons.

These are animals whose characteristics we may absorb through eating. We may not eat scavengers, carnivores or birds of prey—these are not characteristics that we want to absorb at all. There is no question that kashrut has contributed to our survival as a distinct nation as well. Jews all over the world have certain common dietary patterns.

I can be confident that the curried hamin of the Jews of Calcutta has no mixture of milk and meat in its ingredients. When I eat French-Moroccan cuisine I know that the meat is not pork, the animals have been slaughtered according to law and the wine is produced by Jews. Jews meet each other at the local kosher bakery, they shop at the same stores and have their own butchers.

These laws are a major force in maintaining unity, act as a social barrier against assimilation, and create a feeling of community amongst the Jewish people. Another aspect of the kosher laws is the encouragement of a certain degree of aesthetic sensitivity. Judaism prohibits the consumption of animals that have died of natural causes and animals that are deformed or diseased as well as prohibiting the consumption of insects and loathsome foods.

It is possible that one idea behind this is too encourage us to view ourselves with dignity and to act with dignity. One of the best defences against doing that which is immoral, is a strong sense of self-esteem and dignity. Evil should be looked at as beneath our dignity, stealing is stooping too low, gossip is petty and small-minded. In order to help us achieve and maintain this level of dignity the Torah prohibits foods like carcasses and diseased animals. Conclusion top. Some religions seek the path to spirituality through withdrawal from the physical world.

A monastic life is glorified, celibacy and asceticism are seen as ideals. Some view the human as essentially an animal that is incapable of elevating itself beyond the struggle for survival, hence they encourage a life of hedonism and materialism.

Judaism sees the human as an essentially spiritual being, clothed in a physical body. Judaism maintains that the physical is not evil, it is just not the complete view of reality. Judaism seeks to elevate the physical world, not to deny it, nor to glorify it.

The laws of kashrut allow us to enjoy the pleasures of the physical world, but in such a way that we sanctify and elevate the pleasure through consciousness and sensitivity. Kashrut recognises that the essential human need is not food, drink or comfort, but meaning. Judaism, through the dietary laws, injects meaning even into something as commonplace and instinctive as eating.

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