Health Commissioner Wants Kapporot Cleaned Up

The Rockland Department of Health said it has met with organizers in previous years to explain the sanitary code requirements and suggest ways to perform the ritual while still complying with regulations. Those meetings have had little effect. "We meet with them ahead of time and explain what they have to do. And it's still awful."

Rockland Health commissioner wants annual chicken ritual scrutinized
By Jane Lerner • Journal News

RAMAPO — The Rockland Commissioner of Health directed officials today to find out where a Jewish group was planning on holding its annual chicken ritual and to meet with organizers to try to prevent the unsanitary conditions that have led to fines in the past.

"Let's get in touch with them and see what the plan is," Commissioner Joan Facelle directed health inspectors at the monthly meeting of the Board of Health.

Health officials told Facelle that no one from the Jewish community had approached them with a date and location for the annual ceremony involving live chickens.

The kapparot ceremony, in which a chicken is held over a person's head and moved in a circle three times before the bird is slaughtered, part of the introspection that takes place in the days before Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. A prayer is said so the person's sins are symbolically transferred to the chicken. The chicken is then slaughtered and its meat donated to the poor.

Yom Kippur begins the evening of Sept. 17 this year.

A Monsey man who organizes the ceremony for Ramapo's large Jewish population has been fined three years in a row for not adequately cleaning up chicken entrails, feces, carcasses, feet and blood in kapparot ceremonies in Monsey.

Much of the previous years' fines remain unpaid, health officials said.

Members of the Rockland Department of Health said they have met with organizers in previous years to explain the sanitary code requirements and suggest ways to perform the ritual while still complying with regulations.

Those meetings have had little effect, health officials told Facelle.

"We meet with them ahead of time and explain what they have to do," Thomas Micelli, director of environmental health, told Facelle. "And it's still awful."

[Hat Tip: Burich.]

Comments

[harold]

I was waiting for this. As the yom tovim come around it is time to ridicule and make fun of the traditions. First comes kapporot next comes lulav and esrogim and then the succah - I think it was the sechach last year that got bashed.

Sigh! I guess this is how we celebrate yom tov here at FailedMessaih.

[effie]

Then grow a pair and shut them down. If you catch them again, arrest them and keep arresting them. They'll never pay fines but you can cost them a bundle in atty fees and time.

[BeenThereDoneThat]

The more you explain what goes on with religious rites, the more removed it sounds from normality.

You know - it is also perfectly OK to do Kapposos with money, but no, they have to traumatize poor chickens.

Where does G-D fit into this little scheme ?

(By the way, even though I have had the opportunity to do it with chickens many times, I have not done so, as it always seems so cruel - and in my eyes at least, against the basic tenets of halochoh regarding the treatment of animals)

[David]

I was waiting for this. As the yom tovim come around it is time to ridicule and make fun of the traditions. First comes kapporot ..

Harold,

This has nothing to do with ridiculing the traditions. This is about sanitary code violations. The health officials are even prepared to assist them in doing the ritual in accord with sanitary codes. It was not mentioned in this article but I also know in other times and other places there have been concerns by animal welfare agencies about the ways animals are treated.

[Shlomo]

Interesting that this study has just been released by Australian scientists -
"A study by Macquarie University's Doctor Lynn Smith and Professor Chris Evans portrays chickens as social and intelligent creatures which adjust what they say according to who's listening"
Chickens are sentient beings and understand more than we realize whats going on and have their own language

[Devorah]

Harold, you need to come to Rockland after the ceremony and see the blood and feathers still on the ground weeks after the ceremony. A few years ago, they held it on public property and the town had to pay a few thousand dollars to clean up the site. It is a terrible health hazzard and many people got sick from the dead chickens lying around. There is no problem with kapporot, the problem is the stench afterwards. Between the dead chickens and the dead cow they left at an illegal Yeshiva while training students, the hasids are setting a poor sanitary role for the next generation.

[Norm]

On mylast trip to Israel I schelped a rubber chicken all the way to the koetel and did my own versionof Kapport after a Chabnick charged me $10 to put on Teffelin. Why can't the chasidim use a rubber chicken like I did. It orks just as well as with a live chicke-which is of course means it doesn't work.

[harold]

but no, they have to traumatize poor chickens.

... and then the ultimate cruelty - to EAT them!!!

[harold]

I was always scared of the chickens (a chicken all the way) and use money instead. When I was young, the butcher would come to my parents’ house with a couple of chickens. I reluctantly performed the ceremony (don't know who was more frightened, me or the chicken). He then left and I assume my mother's meat order was fulfilled within the next few days.

This day and age who has a butcher?

[harold]

"We meet with them ahead of time and explain what they have to do. And it's still awful."

Maybe the solution is send a man to supervise the event with a few tough looking state troopers behind him for effect?

[Foghorn Leghorn]

In my shul, the rebbe teaches a different minhag. Many of our sins relate to lust, which collects as semen in the male body. So the rebbe teaches that we should symbolically rid ourselves of this lust by draining it into the insides of chickens in the normal way, then we waive the chickens over our heads and then give them to the goyim to eat. They are happy to eat the food. That way, nobody complains.

[BeenThereDoneThat]

LOL !!! Foghorn !!!!

[BeenThereDoneThat]

but no, they have to traumatize poor chickens.

Harold... and then the ultimate cruelty - to EAT them!!!

I think the idea is to cause animals to have as little trauma as possible before they are shechted. Kapporos goes against this doctrine.

[Menachem Mendel lll]

To throw convicted Jewish ganef mumzer kurvenik into prison for fraud, embezzlement or child fornicaton is a mitzvah and service to society.

For a Jewish cocksucker to hurt, mame, injure etc a innocent animal that can trace it's blood line or family tree and in this case her families 'beak' back to Noah who obeyed Adoni's order to build an ark in order to protect & ensure that they survive is Hellul Ha'shem and a crime.

I bench to goht that these Hebrew monsters have a year of pain equal to the pain, misery and anguish they bestowed upon Ha'shem helpless and defenceless creatures.

From my mouth to g-d's ear.

[PishPosh]

Tzar Baalei Chaim and Avodah Zorah at its worse. Avodate Baal, Avodat Dagon, Avodat Moloch.

[chaim1]

you lot are all great talmidei chachomim with all the reasons you come up with against kapporos. in the gemoro they could only find 150 reasons to make you shrozim kosher you could find many more. suprisingly the shuchan aruch agrees with you but he is overruled because he couldnt find enough reasons to ban it. I am not sure why the cruelty is involved unless with all your sins it would be much too heavy for a poor chick to carry it would get holes all over from over weight and be treifa before you start. i would suggest you should use dogs much more your lines.

[David]

It is a terrible health hazzard and many people got sick from the dead chickens lying around.

I thought the chickens were meant to be donated to the poor. In any case, why are so many Charedim such unhygenic slobs?

[Dr. Dave]

Shluggin kaporas would be much more intereting if formalized like a square dance:

Now swing your chicken do se do

Allemande left and circle right

Promenade and courtesy turn

Now bow to your chicken, bow to your shochet

Good night

[Wankele]

Is the rumor I heard about Baruch Lebovits true, i.e. that he is demanding the right to shlog kapporas in his prison cell?

[Wankele]

I further heard that the prison authorities said that it was alright but he could not bring in a chicken to Rikers Island, he would have to use his cell-mate. But this is not acceptable to Lebovits. He is willing to replace the chicken with a man, but he insists that the swingee must be pure white, that is his minhag and thus his religious right. Also the size of his cell must be increased; swinging the cell-mate in a confined space could cause injury before the shchitah and thus the result would be treif.

[Monsey Hocker]

Why all the hoopla over some Jews that want to choke a chicken. Once they start, at like around 10 or 11, they never stop.

[danny]

Pish Posh: "Tzar Baalei Chaim and Avodah Zorah at its worse. Avodate Baal, Avodat Dagon, Avodat Moloch."

Could Pish Posh or someone give a good translation of these terms.

[Shmarya]

Causing pain to animals, idol worship, Ba'al worship, Dagon worship, Moloch worship.

The latter three were gods of the pagan Middle East. Ba'al was worshipped throughout the region; Dagon was a Philistine god; Moloch was a Canaanite god whose service involved baby sacrifice (at least that's what the Tanakh says about it).

[danny]

Thanks for that. Fascinating.

I wish there were a Chiloni Yeshiva. Online would seem to be the ideal place.

[Jeff]

I was waiting for this. As the yom tovim come around it is time to ridicule and make fun of the traditions. First comes kapporot next comes lulav and esrogim and then the succah - I think it was the sechach last year that got bashed.

Sigh! I guess this is how we celebrate yom tov here at FailedMessaih.

Fuck you, you abomination. Fuck you. Frum=Good. That's all you know. Anyone who disagrees - Apikoros! Kofer! You haven't the brains your imaginary friend has given a stick of furniture.

You really are too despicable to be believed. My heartfelt prayer is that you be reincarnated as a yeshiva bocher who gets raped by one of your holy gedloim.

Shmarya, this is just too much, it really is. I can't understand why you don't ban him - and that's only because shooting him and putting him out with the garbage is illegal.

[Devorah]

"I thought the chickens were meant to be donated to the poor. In any case, why are so many Charedim such unhygenic slobs?"

If any poverty sticken person would eat these chickens, serious health hazzards would occur as there is no refrigeration provided afterwards and the chickens are left on the ground to rot, being eaten by flies. Plus, there aren't too many poor charedim in Rockland with section 8, medicaid, food stamps, and stipends being paid for each child born to the "single" mother. All courtesy of your tax dollars.

[sage]

Hi Jeff,

I tend to agree with you.

But, IMHO, Shmarya feels the need allow all to furnish input, even if it is untruthful, rediculous and offensive; doing so avoids any claim that FM is strictly one-sided.

I've been on this blog since December, 2004 and have witnessed many SMR troll cycles. They appear from time to time trying to stir thing up, but a core group always beats them back with the truth, and they fade away.

Harold will eventually meet the fate of all of his predecessors, and gradually fade away.

[Jeff]

Harold will eventually meet the fate of all of his predecessors, and gradually fade away.

I don't think so. I think this one's here to stay. The only reason Archie Bunker went away was that Shmarya banned him, and he only did that because (as I understand it) Archie was collecting and disseminating people's personal info

[Mr. Apikoros]

This is one of many so-called "traditions" which is evil, and stupid.

You cannot transfer your sins to a chicken. Where does God (or G-d, for you frumbags) say you can transfer your sins to a chicken? Why not to a duck, or a snake, or a shtreimel?

Then, of course, you eat the chicken. Since you are what you eat, you simply get your sins right back, while killing a perfectly innocent bird in the process.

And what if someone else eats the chicken? Well, I'll be steering clear of the Colonel during the High Holy Days, especially if I happen to be passing through orthodox dungholes such as Monsey.

Speaking of the High Holy Days, they're especially holy when you're high.

[Alter Kocker]

The idea that the chickens are tortured in this manner, then left to rot in the streets is disgusting. I have only once explained this practice to non-jews and was met with looks of absolute horror.

We need to put a stop to this. The UO need education and re-education as to hygiene. Killing an animal in any way other than the most humane must be outlawed. Where are the health authorities in all of this. Are they fearful of a hassidic uprising? More burning garbage? I fail to understand why there are not charges laid.

Although I have issues with PETA, my sincere hope is that they monitor this situation, and assist the authorities in the laying of charges and jailing those that torture and kill animals for the sake of a custom.

[EileenK]

Why can't kapporot be done in a cruelty free manner, even with live birds? Here is how it might work, first you pay a modest fee to cover the costs of the ceremony and get admitted to the exhibit area.

you may then select your chicken from the display where the birds have adequate, space, shelter, water or food. If you don't know how to pick up and handle her, the attendents can teach you to do this in a way that protects both you and the bird, or you can just put your hands on the enclosure or look in it.

If you choose to hold your bird, you pick her up in the correct way, and confess your sins to her. One person can hold a bird for several people if you feel comfortable with that. If you don't want to hold a bird, you confess your sins through the enclosure fence or cage.

If you held a bird, she goes back in the enclosure wtih the other birds, when you are finished.

At the end of the day, a rabbi comes by and performs a ritual of absolution, absolving the whole display of birds of all their sins. The ritual is moving and ceremonial.

I bet many not so religious folks would come to a cruelty free kapporot to see both the beautiful chickens (Heritage chickens are lovely birds.) in the enclosure and to watch the absolution ceremony at the end of the day.
Then the birds go back to their coop, a little tired, but not much the worse for wear.

[Mr. Apikoros]

Moreover, if one transfers his sins to a chicken, why bother going to shul on Yom Kippur and spending all day in synagogue atoning for your sins? After all, you are now without sin, as you've transfered them to a stupid bird.

Shouldn't it be the chicken who has to fast, and spend the day in temple praying to God in chicklish?

[sage]

Hi Jeff,

You're probably correct, but we have to keep blasting the trolls with the truth.

As they say, "The truth always wins out in the end."

[Streimel Shmuley]

This is not for the goyim to read or to see, but for Yidden to do! Chicken dies whether a Jew follows a minhag or a goy goes to KFC! This is from Har Sinai!

Der Rebbe Gazookt!

[Erstwhile Chabadchic]

What's preventing them from doing kapparot in a responsible and sanitary way? The community is trying to help, and still... zhlubs, zhlubs, zhlubs.

How is this not a chilul Hashem?

[chabib]

If our sins are symbolically transfered
on to the chicken, this foul becomes a
sacrifice. Yet, we are not suppose to offer
sacrifices outside the confines of the
Temple. The custom of Kappors seems to
be in violation of Jewish law. How are
the Hasidim who follow this custom any
differnent than Reform Judasim.

[chabib]

Hey Devoarh are you single ?

[Barry]

What has this world cometo? Arrest these people, and make the fines LARGE enough, that they must all hire attorneys, and make any probation that athey must clean up therir dirt, and filth. Put them all in a chain gang, with brooms, rakes, bags, and put them out in the streets with hoses, and in the heat.
If they don't pay the fines, throw them in jail for contempt of court, and let them sit there for 6 or 12 months.
They'll learn, they must obey the law.

[Jeff]

And another thing - they revere the Rambam and Joseh Caro, until they tell us not to perform kapparot in this manner - then, all of a sudden, they don't know what the hell they're talking about.

As I said in the other thread, frum people are like all people of faith - they just make it up as they go along.

[Menachem Mendel lll]

@ Streimel Shmuley

Since der Rebbe gazookt could you pass on my sincere gut yontif wishes for the sweet n' sour New Year should you bump into him.

Migulgl zol er vern in a henglayhter, by tog zol er hengen, un bay nakht zol er brenen.

[Jeff]

Der Rebbe Gazookt - isn't that this guy?

http://blog.timesunion.com/homers/files/2010/03/GreatGazoo.gif

[anuran]

1) I've never understood why we stopped doing sacrifices after the destruction of the Temple. We did sacrifices before then. Why not go back to the best we can do afterwards? Instead we adopted the pagan custom of communal prayer, something that was never countenanced in Torah.

2) Blood, feces-smeared feathers and rotting carcasses are a public health hazard. Even in the US your right to practice your religion ends when it starts making other people sick.

[Menachem Mendel lll]

"Those who shlug kapoyres and kill chicken will end up killing Jews"

Chaimeleh Pimpotz IV

[Yoel Mechanic]

Kapporos with a live chicken is a good thing to do. Just make sure you do it at one of those place that has the entire kosher line operating so the chickens are plucked, kashered, and packaged right away. This article sounds good too, making sure things are done appropriately in advance. Now I have always seen things done correctly, but because of these reports, everyone should be careful to check out the facilities to make sure everything is in order. (I am rather surprised to hear these negative reports...like I've said, I have *always* seen things done well, shochet on hand, entire production line at the ready, or the chickens are properly shipped back alive to a slaughterhouse, and shected there. I do not see why anyone would waste chickens, or leave garbage behind)

[Monsey Hocker]

MM3, isn't choking a chicken a sin? The rabbiners teach that it causes blindness, obesity and hair falling out. Funny thing is all these frummock rabbis are bald, fat and wear glasses. Yanking their pug is as natural to them as farting after cholent. Hypocritical bastards.

And I am sick of this whiny little biotch Harold. What a poser. A little girl. Methinks he's a goy who still believes in Santa Clause and the Tooth Fayg. If not, he's definitely performed forbidden acts that we leyn about on mincha yom kippur, probably mommy-son or maybe brother-sister shtoopy but I can't be sure.

[BeenThereDoneThat]

ROFL, Mr Hocker, you do the "redneck jew" thing really well !

I can imagine you chewing tebaccy, and spitting it out in a spittoon. (Ding...)

YeeeHaaaaaaa.

Have a good shabbos!

[Monsey Hocker]

"Blood, feces-smeared feathers and rotting carcasses"

Sounds like a santeria ritual gone bad. (All the frummocks who read the blog but never post here just went to google Santeria)

[Bassy the Haredi Slayer]

should symbolically rid ourselves of this lust by draining it into the insides of chickens in the normal way
=====================================

The chicken get killed when you put your thing inside them.... (so I heard from some yeshiva bachurim)

[Devorah]

Chabib, no, married. Very good looking though.

[Devorah]

"Although I have issues with PETA, my sincere hope is that they monitor this situation, and assist the authorities in the laying of charges and jailing those that torture and kill animals for the sake of a custom."

We have written to PETA, but they don't seem to want to get involved. We have written letters and made calls for four years now. Miohael Moore should do a documentary on this.

[Devoarh]

@ Hey Devoarh are you single ?
chabib August 19, 2010 at 11:26 AM
-------------------------------------------------------
Yes I am and why do you ask.

I am considered by many Jewish women and married men to be hot.

I very much enjoy getting dressed up for shabos services. I have a nice selection Jimmy Choo stilettos.

Shabbat Shalom Chabib and Koos Emek.

[Menachem Mendel lll]

Monsey Hocker

R U familiar with the song:
Turning Japanese by The Vapors.

It's code specifically addressing the behind the scenes "lifestyle" of these yiddelach.

Google it if is before your time.

[Monsey Hocker]

Dear Rebbe Shlita Hagaon Hatzadik MM3, thanks, I do know it.

Devorah, you're giving me a woody. Please don't daven for the amud - hearing your voice and picturing you in the Choos and I'll have to run to the bathroom and relieve my discomfort manually.

[harold]

Fuck you, you abomination. Fuck you. Frum=Good. That's all you know. Anyone who disagrees - Apikoros! Kofer! You haven't the brains your imaginary friend has given a stick of furniture.

You really are too despicable to be believed. My heartfelt prayer is that you be reincarnated as a yeshiva bocher who gets raped by one of your holy gedloim.

I feel your pain. Sort of like a black man attending a KKK meeting and you can’t boot him out.

[harold]

I bet many not so religious folks would come to a cruelty free kapporot to see both the beautiful chickens (Heritage chickens are lovely birds.) in the enclosure and to watch the absolution ceremony at the end of the day.
Then the birds go back to their coop, a little tired, but not much the worse for wear.

Sounds good to me.

I think a photographer there taking pictures of the children performing the cerimony and giving/sending/selling/emailing the picture would make it a memorable experience. Certainly better than having kids at a killing field.

[Monsey Hocker]

Harold, your whiny shtick has now gotten older than the crust in your rebbe's boxers. Reminds me of a joke. This chabadsker went to the doctor for a check up and the doc says I need a stool, blood, urine, and semen sample. So the chabadsker takes off his underwear and says, 'let me know when you have the results." Anywho, your assbackwards approach to judaism stinks. When are you gonna get it? ETHICS count MORE THAN rituals. Great yiddin can wear (GASP) blue shirts. There are AISHES CHAYIL women who DON'T COVER THEIR HAIR, who do more chessed than your kind does in ten lifetimes, without the praise and publicity, AND who can sucvk a golf ball through a garden hose to make their man happy instead of whine until they go to their grave because it's the better option. Rubashkin is guilty, the rebbe is dead, and IF moshiach comes it'll be because he starts ignoring the white shirt crowd and focuses on the true bearers of frumkeit today - the Modern Orthodox. Eat that.

[Nigritude Ultramarine]

I was told one can use either a loaf of bread or a fish to do kapporot. Personally, I don't, but for those who must, might I suggest that you give Kosherific Crunchy Fish Sticks a try this year?

Ask your Rav. Maybe you can do Tashlich at the same time.

[harold]

ETHICS count MORE THAN rituals.

Nothing wrong with having both.

[Monsey Hocker]

Pithy. Cute. Nauseating. Right, so, um, a yid that drives on shabbos but doesn't steal is looked upon as equally as a Lakewood crook like Weinstein? Puhleeze.

[Jeff]

Sort of like a black man attending a KKK meeting and you can’t boot him out.

That's right - because you're such a tzaddik that anyone who dislikes you has to be a bigot.

Why do you people let him get away with this crap?

[Dr. Dave]

I am considered by many Jewish women and married men to be hot.

Yeah, but are you a hot normal woman or are you a hot chani?

[harold]

Sort of like a black man attending a KKK meeting and you can’t boot him out.

That's right - because you're such a tzaddik that anyone who dislikes you has to be a bigot.

No because you are acting like this is some form of an exclusive club.

[Jeff]

I'll say it again - for the sake of onlookers rather than for yours - with every comment you leave here, with every particle of loathing and contempt you inspire in others, you violate every precept of the religion you claim to hold so dear.

[anuran]

Harold writes:
ETHICS count MORE THAN rituals.

Nothing wrong with having both.

Alert the press. The some has risen in the West. Harold and I agree on something.

[anuran]

Q$#%@@#$% automatic spell checker.
The sun has risen in the West