Tzohar, the Israeli moderate Zionist Orthodox rabbinical association, has issued a statement opposing using live chickens for the kapparot (atonement) ritual done by many Orthodox and almost all haredi Jews before Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of atonement which begins this year on Friday, October 3 before sundown.
Above: file photo of a haredi man doing kapparot in Israel
Moderate Zionist Orthodox Rabbis Come Out Against Chicken Kapparot
Shmarya Rosenberg • FailedMessiah.com
Tzohar, the Israeli moderate Zionist Orthodox rabbinical association, has issued a statement opposing using live chickens for the kapparot (atonement) ritual done by many Orthodox and almost all haredi Jews before Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of atonement which begins this year on Friday, October 3 before sundown.
The ritual, which crept into Judaism from surrounding pagan societies, is carried out by waving a live chicken or other kosher animal over one’s head while reciting a short liturgy in Aramaic and Hebrew that calls for the sins of the Jew to be transferred to the animal. After the waving is complete, the chicken is slaughtered, preferably as the user watches.
Traditionally, the chicken was then donated to poor people, but in modern times, the slaughtered birds are often piled into garbage bags and dumped in the trash. Tens of thousands of chickens are slaughtered and disposed of that way each fall in New York City alone and the number is exponentially higher in Jerusalem, Bnei Brak and other Israeli cities.
The ritual has always been controversial and some traditional Jewish communities refused to adopt it.
But in haredi communities, especially hasidic communities, the ritual is considered mandatory.
According to a report in Yeshiva World, the Tzohar rabbis said that the modern day version of the ritual is cruel, unnecessary and wasteful and should not be done.
Instead, the Tzohar rabbis called on Jews to use money in place of the chickens, waving the coins or bills over their heads while reciting the liturgy and then donating the money to charity.
This work-around has been commonplace in non-hasidic communities for more than a century, but the more traditional live chicken use has begun to make a comeback even though even rabbis who support the chicken ritual often have serious concerns about the quality of kosher slaughter.
Animal welfare activists also oppose the chicken ritual over what has become the common mistreatment of the chickens before slaughter, their mishandling during the ritual itself and the questionable slaughter that concludes it.