Why keep kosher?

Rabbi Yossy Goldman

Senior Rav Sydenham Highland North Shul

Unfortunately for him, his rabbi was walking down the road behind him and saw him enter the restaurant. The rabbi was shocked. He waited outside to see what the congregantwould order and when the waiter duly arrived and removed the tray cover revealing the swine in all its glory, decorated with the customary apple in its mouth, the rabbi rushed in and confronted the Jew: “How could you?!” he demanded.

The shamefaced Jew trying desperately to explain himself out of a corner replies: “Rabbi, this is such a fancy restaurant. You order an apple and they make such a fuss!”

This week’s Parsha, Shemini, introduces the Bible’s dietary laws. Animals must chew their cud and have split hooves, fish need fins and scales, and a long list of forbidden fowl is enumerated.

To those of us in Jewish education, it is a continuing source of disappointment that so many Jews still believe the kosher laws to be outdated. After all, they reckon, in the desert our ancestors needed to protect themselves from trichinosis and all sorts of diabolical diseases, so some kind of dietary system was needed. But today, they argue, in an age of government inspection and modern hygiene standards, kashrut is archaic, anachronistic and quite dispensable.

How sad. The fact is that the kosher laws were never given to us for health reasons. If they happen to be healthy or provide good hygiene, that is purely a fringe benefit. It may well be one of the perks but it has never been the reason.

I often joke that if kashrut was for health, then all the rabbis should look like Arnold Schwarzenegger! And those who don’t keep kosher should look sickly. In fact, anecdotal evidence seems to prove the very opposite. Your average religious type looks rather scrawny (or overweight) and the non-kosher guys are the ones with the big biceps!

So let it be stated categorically: Kashrut is not for our physical health but for our spiritual health. It is not for our bodies but for our souls. It is a Jewish diet to help Jews remain spiritually sensitive to their innate Jewishness.

While the Torah actually records no official reason for these laws, the rabbis and philosophers have speculated on their purpose. They act as a bulwark against assimilation, we are taught.

On a simple level, if we keep kosher, inexorably, we will remain close to Jewish communal life. We will shop in the Jewish neighbourhood, possibly find it more convenient to live nearby and generally mix in Jewish company.

A rabbinic friend of mine once asked a very high-profile Jewish businessman why he was about to marry a non-Jewish woman. Couldn’t he find a “nice Jewish girl?” His reply was very revealing: “I just don’t mix in those circles anymore, Rabbi.”

There is no doubt that had he still kept kosher he would have been compelled to mix in Jewish circles and his life choices might well have been very different.

On a deeper, more spiritual level, keeping kosher keeps our Jewish souls sensitive to things Jewish. This is clearly a mystical concept and completely imperceptible, but according to our Sages it is a fact. Just as too much red meat or fatty foods are bad for your cholesterol, non-kosher foods are bad for your neshoma. They clog your spiritual arteries and prevent those warm, healthy Jewish feelings from circulating through your kishkes and your consciousness.

It’s very important to have a mezuzah on your door. It identifies your home as Jewish. But what really defines your home as a “Jewish home” – what your zaida meant when he said with pride: “My children run a Jewish home” – is the kitchen!

A kosher kitchen makes a Jewish home truly Jewish. It also extends a very warm and eloquent invitation to all fellow Jews: Here you are welcome. Here it is safe to come in and eat. Make yourself at home.

Your favourite diet may build healthy bodies but a kosher diet builds healthy souls.