16 March 2015

Kosher Eating

26 Adar 5775


What passes for kosher among most Jews today is not really kosher. We often worry about how unkosher eating can damage our bodies, but I wonder if we worry enough about the damage that it is doing to our souls.
...Almost everything is being influenced by the Egel Hazahav [the “Golden Calf” excessive materialism and the ways of the non-Jews]. Everything we eat has a hechsher but how much of what we eat is really kosher? How much of it is fit to be eaten by a Jew who wants truly kosher food?
And even if the food is kosher, often the wrapper or the advertisement is not kosher. That is a catastrophe because once the wrapper is not kosher the whole thing is not kosher. Because this exposes the Jew and his family to non-kosher images and foreign attitudes that can damage their spirituality, G-d forbid. This endangers their eternal life.
Ice cream, potato chips, hamburgers, chewing gum, pizzas and so on - all that junk has no place in the life of a Jew. This brings the lusts and impurity of the street inside the Jew. Coca-cola, Seven-up, Jump, etc., it's all non-kosher since it is part of the desires and lusts of the goyim [non-Jews].
Even if the ingredients are kosher, the whole street-like style is forbidden. It is similar to Adam and Eve eating from the tree of knowledge: it causes the Evil Inclination and impurities of the non-Jewish nations to come inside us. It changes us both physically and spiritually.
In addition, frequently the actual ingredients are not kosher. Much of the meat we buy today is really not kosher, or at least not on the level of kashrus a true Jew should insist upon eating. And I am not referring only to Israel, America or Europe. In this matter, there are problems the world over.
Everything is potentially problematic; the vegetables, the meat, the milk, all the various baked goods etc. Everything can be problematic because everything is influenced by huge profits. [However it is important to understand that all these and other problems are also important reasons for strengthening and encouragement, because they are signs that our Redemption is very close, and with it the rectification of all problems in the world, as promised by many prophesies in the Bible, see Isaiah 2, Mahral Netsach Yisrael chapter 35, etc. etc.].
A Jew must eat kosher. But he does not need to eat pizza, parve foods that taste like meat, parve foods that taste like cheese, all sorts of ice cream and sweets and so on. These are all part of the lusts of the gentile world.
We must be modest in everything, including in what we eat. We need to eat simple food without too many ingredients that is made at home. It is much easier to be sure of the Kashrus of homemade food, and obviously such food is much healthier for the body and for the soul....  (Source)
Something to think about and improve upon. 

6 comments:

  1. Are you for real? In what way are these foods of widespread enjoyment forbidden, just because gentiles enjoy them or manufactured them first? On the contrary, one should enjoy what is not abjectly forbidden in the Torah, in moderation of course. Sara uk

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    1. Again, it is the culture that accompanies these foods that is at issue and the fact that many or most are not healthy, have no nutritional value and can not only cause physical illness, but can also dull our spiritual sensitivity. Allow your intellect to be challenged on this issue and ponder on it. You may change your mind.

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  2. Agree basically with both above comments. Just walking in the street and going shopping for something that is needed exposes the person to a myriad of outside influences. That, in itself, does not change the observant Jew. Eating many of the fast foods as mentioned in the article is fine; the main thing - it must be kosher. If we go extreme then that might turn off some Jews who would like to learn more of . Judaism. There is an old Yiddish expression - the Jew should always remain steadfast 'to G-D and to man'. In other words, not be a Nazarite. What is troubling is copying non-kosher foods such as treife fish (of course, using kosher fish). In other words, mock foods or like the articles states, dairy ingredients that are pareve and used after eating meat, which feels like one is eating dairy after meat. This is where the orthodox world has gone bananas, trying to be like the goyim. The last decade or two has been a roller coaster for everyone - all signs of the coming of Moshiach (may it be immediately).
    nili

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  3. Yossi, pizza and hamburgers are central to the fast-food culture that originated in America. It's neither healthy nor holy. And what is ice cream, but pure pleasure? It has no nutritional value at all and was unknown to the world before refrigeration. Don't be so quick to write off something as "ridiculous" just because it's a foreign concept to you now.

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  4. I try to make everything fresh at home. We don't eat out in restaurants. But that is us. Making homemade pizza for your children is just fine. Many Frum very Frum families unfettered by outside influences manage to enjoy food items they make themselves. Pesach is always with parve dessert, cakes or ice cream. One cn make coconut "ice cream" to enjoy in the hot summers, or even homemade fruit freezes. There is absolutely nothing wrong or subversive about them. Where one's head is, is the defining factor. Too strict and one will be held accountable after 120, for NOT enjoying HaShem's creative world, albeit with discretion.

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  5. “In the future, each person will have to give an accounting for everything he saw that he didn’t eat.” (Jerusalem Talmud Kiddushin 4:12)

    Yossi

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