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Eating Glatt Kosher Meat Sephardim, who follow the rulings of Rabbi Yosef Caro (The Beit Yosef) are required to consume only Glatt kosher meat. Ashkenazim, who follow the rulings of Rabbi Moshe Isserles (The Rema) may consume non-Glatt meat. However, … Continue reading →

Kosher Slaughter The animal must be slaughtered in the proper manner as prescribed by Halacha. This is done by a highly trained certified ritual-slaughterer (shochet). The certification for ritual-slaughter is called “Kabbala” (קבלה). In order to receive kabbala a person … Continue reading →

Prohibition of Eating Neveilah or Treifah It is forbidden to eat the meat of an animal that died by itself or was not slaughtered in accordance to the laws of Shechitah (kosher slaughter). Such an animal is called a neveilah … Continue reading →

Kosher and Non-Kosher Fowl The Torah lists twenty-four families of non-kosher birds which, according to modern scientific classification, include thousands of known species and sub-species. Some of the non-kosher birds listed in the Torah are the barn owl, bat, cormorant, … Continue reading →

What Makes It Kosher As stated above, all the kosher laws were either commanded by G-d at Sinai and incorporated in the Torah along with the other mitzvoth; are oral traditions which go back to Moses, who received them from … Continue reading →

The Ultimate Purpose of Creation As we said above, the purpose of the seven Noahide laws is to civilize the world in order to make it a settled, wholesome place. However, on a deeper level, the ultimate purpose of the … Continue reading →

Eating the Limb of a Living Animal Originally, until the time of Noah, mankind was not meant to eat meat. Adam was commanded, “You may certainly eat of all the trees of the garden but as for the tree of … Continue reading →

Testimonies, Statutes and Judgments Besides narrative, the Torah is also comprised of 613 commandments (mitzvoth). There are several ways these mitzvoth may be categorized. The most fundamental is that there are 248 positive commandments and 365 negative commandments. In other … Continue reading →

Because of the limits of the blog format we will not be posting footnotes to the halachic sources quoted by Rabbi Markel. While they are present in the hard copy of Going Kosher (available here) in this case it just … Continue reading →

Part I. Why Go Kosher? 1) Testimonies, Statutes and Judgments. 2) Divine Universal Standards. Part II. What does Kosher Mean? 1) Fit, Proper and good. 2) Eating the Limb of a Living Animal 3) The Seven Noachide Laws 4) Preventing … Continue reading →