By Susan R. Weintrob
I WAS STANDING in a congenial group at a cocktail party when hors d'oeuvres
were passed around. I politely shook my head. By the third pass, one of
the other guests noticed my refusal. "Come on, try it. Looks fabulous." The guest
took one and munched contentedly. I shook my head. The guest persisted.
"What's in it?" I asked my hostess.
"Browned beef, pork sausage and Monterey cheese," she told me.
Smiling at her, I shook my head. "I can't eat it."
I thought nothing more of the matter until, later on that evening, the older gentleman, who had urged me to taste the hors d'oeuvres, came up to me.
"I want to apologize for asking you to eat those hors d'oeuvres. I didn't
realize that you followed your dietary laws."
"Oh, you mean that I keep kosher ?" I responded.
The fella nodded, looking nonplused at my use of the word kosher. "Isn't that difficult for you? Can you ever eat at other people's houses?"
I explained that all my friends knew that our family keeps kosher and were
very accommodating. "I really don't have much of a problem."
The person looked surprised.
I felt no less surprised. The person with whom I spoke is Jewish, belongs to
a synagogue, is a long-time member of its board of trustees and is a regular
participant at Shabbat services.
I was reminded of the wicked son's use of the word "you" and not "we" in
the Haggadah : what your holiday means, when you were brought out of
Egypt.
Now, I do not think this fellow party-goer is wicked, but I wonder why, despite
many years of affiliation with the Jewish community, the question about kashrus
observance was phrased in a way that obviously did not include him.
I am used to curiosity about our family keeping kosher. In our town, we are
the only family that has a kosher home and maintains kashrus outside the
home.
For years, we had not gone to dinners at the local Reform congregation that
we used to belong to because they not only did not maintain kashrut, but served
treif, and mixed meat and milk on the same table.
However, an interesting phenomena has taken place at this synagogue,
representative of trends across the US. A vegetarian option was mandated by
the board, so that those who wish to make the move towards kashrut may attend
holiday or Shabbat dinners. This motion was supported by most of the board
members. When some spoke out against this option, a person who had only
recently converted to Judaism spoke up. "I would hope that the board would
support, not oppose, those people who move towards kashrus." The motion
passed.
In the past, many Jews hid observances from their neighbors or fellow
workers. Some groups moved away from following kashrus, labeling it a "tribal," or
"superstitious" ritual. "Be a Jew at home and a man in the street," was a
saying familiar to many. Today's generation no longer feels this necessity.
Today more young families are interested in keeping kosher.
While many non-religious Jews may not start out with two sets of dishes, they often do not eat pork, or mix milk and meat. They are respectful of kashrus as a Jewish tradition.
The party-goer is from the generation of my uncle and stepfather, who had to
change names to get jobs. These experiences remain with them. Today, Jewish
identification and observance are no longer "treif" to the American public.
Those who are openly Jewish and traditional no longer feel out of the
mainstream of American life.
While my fellow guest showed surprise that our friends were
aware that we follow Jewish traditions, history has shown us that
anti-Semites do not temper their feelings because of the level of a Jew's kashrus
observance.
There is no doubt that keeping kosher has been a mark of Jewish identity for
several thousand years. While many Jews have sought to find practical
reasons that kashrus is beneficial, the Torah unites kashrut with holiness, not
health.
Many non-Orthodox Jews follow the traditional reasoning as well. In Rabbi
Joseph Telushkin's popular Jewish Literacy, he offers an interesting
interpretation on the effects of maintaining kashrus. He connects the
non-violent behavior of Jews to the prohibition on hunting, cruel slaughtering
techniques, and consumption of the blood of an animal. According to
Telushkin, the reason Jews commit violent crimes at a lower rate than their non-Jewish
neighbors is not because of genetic differences. He attributes this characteristic to kashrus, which "has helped civilize the Jewish spirit."
Our sages have understood that the meaning of the word "kosher" is derived from
morality, not diet. Therefore, the word "kosher" itself has nothing to do
with food. It is used in the sense of being proper or ethical. Thus one can ask
about any project or enterprise, "Is it kosher?" --- meaning is it legal or
respectable.
Unlike diets which count calories, keeping kosher counts something else --- a
sense of what is proper and what is "treif." Keeping kosher does not
separate us negatively from our neighbors, anymore than other disciplines we impose
upon ourselves, such as recycling our resources or exercising regularly. Kashrus
unites us with the Jewish people, tells us to restrain our appetites.
Some things are permitted, some are not. Children brought up in kosher homes
learn early on that not only our food but our actions can be "kosher."
As an adult, my husband began to follow kashrus in stages. One night, after
he decided to eliminate non-kosher food from his diet outside our home, he had
a real test. Following a six-hour recording session of his chamber music
group, a platter of food was brought to the musicians --- jumbo shrimp. Despite being
very hungry, he refused. He commented later that if he had been on a diet and
chocolate cake had been brought out, there would have been no doubt that he
would have broken his diet. He had amazed even himself.
While there is no easily visible hechsher (rabbinical supervision) mark stamped on many life decisions we must make, keeping kosher reminds us daily who we are and who we want to
JWR contributor Susan Rubin Weintrob is based at the National Jewish Post and Opinion and is a faculty member of Ball State University's English Department.
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