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> These tiny invertebrates can be found in the deepest ocean trenches and the highest alpine lakes, even in damp mosses and wet leaf litter. Walter once got a c
by CommitSyn 4y ago
> These tiny invertebrates can be found in the deepest ocean trenches and the highest alpine lakes, even in damp mosses and wet leaf litter. Walter once got a call from an Orthodox Jewish organization wanting to know if there were pieces of non-kosher creatures floating in the New York City tap water. The answer was yes. It’s hard to avoid these relatives of shrimp and lobster—Walter has studied them all over the world, in the Red Sea as well as Antarctica. Wherever there’s water, copepods thrive.
I'm wondering how this was handled in the end. Do Orthodox Jews drink the tap in NYC today?
- oboes 4y agoAn article about that question: https://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/07/nyregion/the-waters-fine-but-is-it-kosher.html https://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/07/nyregion/the-waters-fine-...
- aliqot 4y agoI guess nobody's going to mention the elephant in the room, so I'll take the hit. Where the hell am I supposed to find tiny kosher cocktail sauces?
- alistairSH 4y agoGuidance from rabbis varies (no central source of authority in Judaism). Some orthodox rabbis will view the copepods as not kosher and suggest filtering the water. Less orthodox rabbis will say the water is fine because the copepods are not visible to the naked eye.
- mc32 4y agoThat frees the vision impaired a bit relative to people with good eyesight from a few things!
- raphael_l 4y agoDoes that mean blind jews can use this as precedent to eat whatever they like?
- mc32 4y agoLooks like some rabbis might allow some liberal interpretation so I guess the answer is it depends… Flexibility is good.
- TchoBeer 4y agoNo, that would be silly. "The Naked Eye" is what normal human eyes can see without aid. There is a lot of grey area there, but microscopic creatures that you can only see with specialized equipment invented in the past 100 years certainly are not visable to the naked eye for any reasonable definition of naked eye.
- aliqot 4y agoWithin reason, it's nothing, or `betal bshishim` which is equated to one sixtieth. It's void, as a concept, in Hebrew tradition. It helps if you think about it in terms of historical hardships of the Hebrews. It means if you're hungry and your neighbor cooks for you and there's a tiny bit of non-kosher fat in the soup or something like that, or if you're starving, Yahweh will forgive you because it's such a small amount and you're so hungry it's not right to penalize you for that which you couldn't control. Something that is one sixtieth is colloquially so insignificant that it equates to nil.
- javajosh 4y agoThis general approach is true within all Jewish traditions. For example, if you get sick on Shabbat you're allowed to drive to the hospital (and doctors are allowed to help you), or if you're ill during Rosh Hashana you don't have to fast. It's a very nice aspect of Judaism: "follow the rules, yes, but don't be stupid about it."
- billiam 4y agoWonder how the rabbi feels about the mites and spiders that we all end up swallowing on a regular basis. What an absurd reductive view of life.
- TchoBeer 4y agoThe short answer is yes, except a tiny minority who require a filter that can filter the tiny guys. But it's a whole discourse.