Are You Ethically Kosher?

Saturday August 2, 2008

Categories: Judaism, News, Pop Culture, Religion

That's the big question being addressed by Hekhsher Tzedek, an initiative led primarily by rabbis in the Conservative movement, most notably Rabbi Morris Allen of Beth Jacob Congregation in Mendota Heights, Minnesota. With new guidelines just released in which they...

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Filed Under: eating, eco-kosher, ethical kashrut, ethics, food, halakha, heksher tzedek, jewish law, kashrut, kosher, kosher food, rabbi morris allen

posted by Brad Hirschfield @11:05am Permalink email icon

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Kishkeman

August 3, 2008 6:27 PM

I want to know if there is any synagogue run by the Conservative Jewish movement that could qualify for the Heksher Tzedek. My local Conservative Jewish synagogue does not provide a 401 k plan for its staff, it does not provide affordable health insurance, it does not provide a living wage for its full time preschool teachers, and it does not provide more than 12 weeks leave of maternity leave.

So many Conservative Jews are so jewishly illiterate today. Our synagogues are desparate for adult On a national level the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism is pretty much broke. Their dues to keep membership in USCJ are enormous and the services they provide are so limited. And in spite of all that the USCJ and the Rabbinical Assembly is going to use whatever resources that are left to find the most prisitine companies around. Get Real.

LAURA MUSHKAT

August 5, 2008 12:25 PM

I am confused-I do not understand this article at all.

Something eather is kosher or not. Who needs all this stuff. You are worried about a certain food and how it is made-we got the INTERNET!

If you have the ability to read you know how something is made, if the product has kosher or non-kosher products in it.

The idea of all these various symbols from this or that group is not really needed any longer.

The only time you need to worry is when you wonder if something altho kosher all year round is OK for Passover. That is really it.

We certainly do not need anything new! Enough already!

chinkjunior

August 6, 2008 10:49 AM

Stop with this nonsense. Just like I wouldnt want my favorite eatery to be denied rabbinic supervision because of the music it plays, the posters on the walls, or if (God forbid) there is a dance floor that allows mixed dancing, so too this BS with "hechsher tzedek." The fact that organized conservative jewry is all of a sudden interested just shows some willing ortho-bashing for a stupid Rubashkin mistake.

Rabbi Henry Jay Karp

August 7, 2008 11:50 AM

I am shocked and disappointed by the comments posted here so far. When Jews start separating the ritual mitzvot from the ethical mitzvot then all that is left is a heartless, conscienceless Judaism. There is a profound hypocrisy in someone who claims to be living a Jewish life because they are observant of the rituals yet oblivious of our ethical obligations in the treatment of fellow human beings and God's creatures. Probably no one has said this better than the prophet Isaiah:

"To be sure, they seek Me daily, eager to learn My ways. Like a nation that does what is right, that has not abandoned the laws of its God, they ask Me for the right way, they are eager for the nearness of God: "Why, when we fasted, did You not see? When we starved our bodies, did You not pay heed?" Because on your fast day you see to your business and oppress all your laborers! Because you fast in strife and contention, and you strike with a wicked fist! Your fasting today is not such as to make your voice heard on high. Is such the fast I desire, a day for men to starve their bodies? Is it bowing the head like a bulrush and lying in sackcloth and ashes? Do you call that a fast, a day when the Lord is favorable? No, this is the fast I desire: To unlock the fetters of wickedness, and untie the cords of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free; to break off every yoke. It is to share your bread with the hungry, and to take the wretched poor into your home; when you see the naked, to clothe him, and not to ignore your own kin."

If Isaiah were to return and visit Postville, he would be ashamed to be a Jew!

Lbenjdale

August 7, 2008 1:13 PM

If Isaiah were to visit Postville he would have preached "Dan l'chaf zchut."

And what are vapid, ethically universal bromides with no ritual underpinnings? Not a Judaism that Isaiah or I would recognize or want to practice. Did the harm that would attend to "guilty until proven innocent" ever enter the moral calculus of the Jewish protesters in Postville? I think not. In the main, their congregants observe neither the ethical nor ritual obligations of kashrut (which I think is a false dicotomy), so who cares if a business that caters primarily to the Orthodox community is harmed? And how ironic, that their protest occured during the three weeks preceding tisha b'av, when all Jews should be working diligently to purge sinat chinam from their words, hearts and deeds. Suggestion: Seek michilah for your Postville transgressions at your shul's observance, although from your synagogue's website it appears as if you do not observe that day in the Jewish calendar.

rabbi brad

August 7, 2008 2:08 PM

And I am saddened by the anger and stridency that is shared by you both. Enough with the sacred sanctimony. How about giving each other a break?