AFP AUDIO INTERVIEW
Bill Sleight, a former New Jersey police officer and former member of the enforcement arm of the N.J. Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, is a thorn in the side of Lakewood’s Hasidic community. This is his third year surveilling the Orthodox Jews there, as they perform a torture and sacrifice ritual with live chickens.
Kapparot, or kaporos, where an Orthodox Jew, or frum, swings a live chicken over their head three times and then slaughters them, is occurring in the streets of Hasidic neighborhoods across America this week in preparation for the holiest day of the year for Jews, the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur.
Dave Gahary sat down with Bill on 9/21/2015, to discuss what he uncovered, in this disturbing interview (12:13).
AFP AUDIO INTERVIEW
Karen Davis is the founder and president of United Poultry Concerns (UPC), a 25-year-old nonprofit organization that promotes the compassionate and respectful treatment of chickens, turkeys, ducks, and other domesticated fowl. She became aware of the Kaporos ritual in 1994, when people from New York City, where a high percentage of Jews reside, tipped her off to the practice.
In fact, UPC had recently filed suit against New York City, the NYPD and local Jewish leaders in state Supreme Court, to stop the torture and slaughter ritual, but Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Debra James ruled that the practice can proceed, clearing the way for thousands of chickens to be killed this week in the 2,000-year-old ritual.
Dave Gahary sat down with Karen on 9/30/2014, to discuss her organization, in this informative interview (31:58).
Jewish Animal Sacrifice in America’s Streets Protected by Government
• A ‘fowl’ holocaust highlights Jewish power.
By Dave Gahary
While AMERICAN FREE PRESS reported in December, 2011 on how Orthodox Jewish child sex predators are protected by various American law enforcement authorities, we can now add hundreds of thousands of chickens to the list of victims the government will turn a blind eye to, as long as they’re being abused by Jews, as a Jewish ritual practiced on the eve of a major Jewish holiday is shining a bright light on how political influence can trump even the vilest of religious practices.
Kapparot, or kaporos, where an Orthodox Jew, or frum, swings a live chicken over their head three times and then slaughters them, is occurring in the streets of Hasidic neighborhoods across America this week in preparation for the holiest day of the year for Jews, the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur.
However, it’s not just an innocent whirl around a yarmulke and a quick slice to the throat for these birds, but hundreds of hours of torture, where they spend the last few days of their lives in miserable pain and unimaginable agony.
The origin of the practice finds its roots in the Bible, in the book of Isaiah. Although it was strongly opposed by some rabbis, it was approved by others in the ninth century, and the practice became generally accepted among the Jews of Eastern Europe, whose offspring migrated to our shores with their peculiar form of animal sacrifice.
Karen Davis is the founder and president of United Poultry Concerns (UPC), a 24-year-old nonprofit organization that promotes the compassionate and respectful treatment of chickens, turkeys, ducks, and other domesticated fowl. She became aware of the ritual in 1994, when people from New York City, where a high percentage of Jews reside, tipped her off to the practice.
“They were very distressed about the chickens being forced to sit in transport crates out on the streets of the city, without food, water or any shelter or really any attention from anybody,” Ms. Davis explained.
“Kaporos is a medieval custom whereby a man is supposed to swing a rooster and a woman is supposed to swing a hen, over their heads, and recite a chant, which basically says, ‘I’m passing my sins and punishment onto you, this chicken, who is going to suffer and die in my place so that I can have a long and happy life.’”
“One of the cruelest aspects of this ritual is how the practitioners hold the birds by their wings,” Davis explained. “They actually suspend the chickens by their wings and often will just stand around and chat with one another, holding these birds in this totally inhumane way, which is both painful for the birds and potentially injurious. They’ll just be holding the birds as if they had a large bag of groceries they were holding down at their sides, with no show at all of any glimmer of compassion for these birds.”
“The birds are trucked in from factory farms, and by the time they appear on the city streets, they might have already not had any food or water for nine, 10, 12 or more hours. Then they sit out on the streets immobilized in transport crates and are not given any food, water or any relief from the weather.”
“Last year,” Davis informed, “2,500 chickens died of heat stress because of the unusually warm weather in late September.”
The Jews treat the chickens this way on purpose.
“They’re treated like what they are intended to be in the ritual, punished objects,” she explained. “The only role of the chicken in the ritual is to be a symbolic recipient of the sins or wrongdoings and the punishment of the practitioner, to be mistreated, to be punished.”
Although numerous anti-cruelty and health code laws are being violated, the states of New York and New Jersey not only turn a blind eye, but dispatch police to protect the abusers, all at taxpayer expense.
“The Hasidic community give[s] a lot of money to politicians, and the word comes down from on high that they are not supposed to be touched,” Davis said. “The police are always there when we, the protesters, are there, to protect the practitioners, to be allowed to conduct their illegal practices. It’s a political thing which is based on a lot of money going into the pockets of the powers-that-be.”
“They’re allowed to do these illegal things, slaughtering thousands of birds in open-air tents in residential areas, allowing blood and feces and feathers to be in drains, to be floating in the air, where city law enforcement should be enforcing, but due to the politics of things, they are allowing these practitioners to break the law, year after year.”
Jewish spokespersons and print and online material claim the slaughtered birds are donated to the poor, but this is simply a public relations ploy.
The all-powerful rabbis “mislead their practitioners into thinking that the majority of these chickens are going to go to the poor, but in fact most of the birds don’t,” Davis explained.
“They throw dead and alive birds with cut throats who are still alive and writhing in pain and often crying, into big black plastic trash bags and leave them there on the street or throw them into dumpsters, which are often seeping with blood coming out into the drains and gutters, and they leave them there for the city sanitation workers to cart off to landfills.”
Another factor at play here is the money to be made off the suffering of these chickens by the rabbis who sanction the ritual, where the birds are purchased for a few dollars and sold to members of the congregation for a lot more.
“They’re selling them for anywhere from $18 to $26,” Davis said. “So in the guise of religion, those who are leading the ritual, the temples and the rabbis, are saying that, “Oh, we have to have this ritual,’ and are keen on maintaining it because they make a lot of money out of it.”
Although the United States Supreme Court upheld First Amendment protections to Santeria adherents to practice ritual animal sacrifice in the 1993 decision Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City of Hialeah, laws are still being violated.
“At most the ritual itself is protected, unfortunately, by the First Amendment,” Davis explained, “but birds being forced to sit in a transport crate on city streets without any care at all, is not protected. And the First Amendment does not supersede the health codes of the city of New York or the State anti-cruelty statute.”
The numbers of tortured and slaughtered chickens can easily run into the hundreds of thousands during the days leading up to the holiday, due to the fertility rates of these Hasidic communities and the ritual’s rules.
Although one chicken is sacrificed for each Jew, and the average Hasidic family has between six and seven children, three chickens are abused and slaughtered for pregnant women, and varying numbers of birds are used for individuals and in varying conditions.
“I have heard that that they use as many as anywhere from 50-to-65,000 chickens in New York altogether,” Davis said.
Just in the town of Lakewood, New Jersey, where around 100,000 Hasidic Jews reside, which this newspaper reported on in June of this year, upwards of 150,000 chickens may pay the ultimate price so a Hasidic Jew can feel good about their future.
The ringleaders of this foul practice sometimes use the “anti-Semitism” card to fend off criticism, and Ms. Davis and the organization have had accusations of “anti-Semitism” hurled against them in the past.
“To suggest that this is about anti-Semitism is ridiculous,” Davis said. “This is not about anti-Semitism; it’s about extreme animal cruelty that is practiced by this particular group of people who are Jewish. But for them to say this is anti-Semitic is to be put on the defensive, so we should hurry and try to defend ourselves against charges of anti-Semitism. We don’t even get into that. These are people who are treating chickens cruelly, and that is why we are on their case.”
All hope is not lost, as there has been progress made.
In the Pico-Robertson neighborhood in Los Angeles, California, a few chicken torture/slaughter sites have been shut down for health code violations, and UPC is pursuing a Freedom of Information Act request to find out whether permits are filed for the rituals in N.Y.
In New Jersey, Bill Sleight, a former Garden State police officer and former member of the enforcement arm of the N.J. Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (NJSPCA), is a thorn in the side of Lakewood’s Hasidic community.
The first night the birds arrived in that shore town, Sleight went undercover wearing a yarmulke, and mingled with the crowd.
“I said, ‘You know, we don’t have to do this. These birds aren’t getting water. How could you not give them water?’”
“A man replied, ‘Get serious, we don’t water them. Listen, anybody wants to complain, they should care more about ISIS cutting people’s heads off then us cutting off the chickens’.’”
Sleight witnessed a wall of chickens languishing on the street.
They were “nine crates high and four deep,” he said, “and have been here since sundown last night; no food, no water.”
“The [New Jersey] Department of Agriculture [NJDA] regulations say they can’t be in the crates more than 18 hours,” Sleight explained. “Well, it’s certainly over that.”
Sleight thought of contacting the NJDA, but it was a Sunday. Same with the NJSPCA.
On Monday he was able to speak with the NJDA, who told him they were aware of the matter and suggested he fill out an online complaint form.
“I can’t reach anybody,” the former cop and NJSPCA investigator said. “Nobody wants to [expletive deleted] with them.”
This reporter asked Sleight if he was aware of any enforcement actions taken against the practitioners.
“Never done anything, I know that,” he said.
Sleight witnessed a trailer dropping upwards of 3,000 chickens in front of a yeshiva, a Jewish school.
“They dropped about eight o’clock that night,” he said. “The next day they were still in there, and they didn’t start unloading them until one o’clock.”
With the temperature soaring to 90°F, Sleight tried to talk to the frum who came to throw him off the property, with no success.
“I came back at five o’clock, and they were actually loading them up again,” he said.
Sleight explained what happened when he tried to help an injured chicken.
“I see a bird that’s hurt,” he began. “They hire these little, Jewish kids to take the birds out of the crates; 10, 11, 12-year-olds. They hold it up by the wings. That’s gotta hurt. They’re grabbing them, and they’re rough. They’re rough because they’re doing it fast, and they’re stupid kids, you know, they’re kids! So I see this chicken with a little blood on his back, like the birds picked on him. Well, once a bird is damaged, it’s like kosher, you can’t touch it now. They can’t use it in their voodoo dance.”
Sleight tried to buy the chicken, but the rabbi refused.
“He said, ‘We don’t sell to you,’ and I said, ‘Whaddya mean you don’t sell to me, I wanna buy a bird.’ He said, ‘This is for religious practices only,’ and I said, ‘Well not that one over there. He’s wounded, and that’s the one I want.’ ‘We don’t sell to you,’ he said. I said, ‘What, to the goys?’ and he said, ‘We’re not in the chicken business with the goyim, we don’t sell to you.’”
The rabbi gestured with his hand for Sleight to go away.
Undeterred, Sleight approached two separate frums to ask if they would buy the bird for him, but they both declined, citing religious reasons and not wanting to lie to the rabbi. He eventually coaxed, with a $20 bill, a Mexican day laborer to get him the chicken when the rabbi wasn’t around.”
“I looked at the bird and realized it had a compound fracture of the wing,” he said. “From grabbing it, they snapped its wing.”
One of the frums, an 18-year-old, got Sleight a box, and while he and Sleight were walking down the street with it, the frum that kicked him off the property earlier in the day accosted him.
“He comes running across the street, cuts me off, and grabs the box,” he said.
Sleight’s companion said, “I gave him that chicken,” and the man said “It’s not yours to give to them.”
“He pulled the box so hard,” Sleight explained, “it ripped open and the chicken fell out, and they grabbed the chicken and they ran off.”
Soon after, Sleight found out two Lakewood police cars were looking for him.
“I was a cop; I know how to duck cops. You walk down the street and you walk into an apartment complex and they lose you. That’s what I did. But I was watching them and they were circling the block looking for this guy that ‘assaulted’ one of the Jews.”
Dave Gahary, a former submariner in the U.S. Navy, is the host of AFP’s ‘Underground Interview’ series.
Be sure to check out all of AFP’s free audio interviews. You’ll find them on the HOME PAGE, ARCHIVES & AUDIO section.
To bring us all up to date, though………
Jew, do you renounce religious blood sacrifice???
Another, please. Is your primary loyalty as an American citizen to America or do you as holders of “dual citizenship” place equal priority to loyalty to a foreign nation???
Me thinks Jew has been too successful in the past with mere oratory utterances to avoid a truth in discussions……and a failure to admit an understanding of why citizens in those “other” nations Jew resides in as seeing Jew as TRAITOR and invader. Jew stays a Jew regardless where.
If one does not adhere to a Jewish religion, why is it Jew is Jew then??? It is not race……as conversion is allowed religiously and by Jewish law (Jewish superstition without it being religious). Yet, even with that, Jew seems to be the most racist of all. Anti-Muslim (even with their own half-brothers they manage a racist attitude). Anti-White (“White Supremacy” is a huge villain if one watches television and movies out of Hollywood (where a Jewish Supremacy is viewed as good and desirable). So Jew isn’t religious. Jew isn’t race (although Jew is obviously racist). What is Jew???
Identity supremacy and insatiable greed is what it seems we are left with…….AND a need to control the lives of others that are not Jew. (A very UNDESIRABLE trait as viewed by the majority of people……we Humans….vs Neanderthal, as that may be a better description. Empathy and sympathy are Human traits. They exhibit none, except when it generates some various profit. Maybe the difference isn’t race at all…..but that of species.)
In the Jewish religious practice of Kapparot, a cockerel literally becomes a religious and sacred vessel and is swung around the head and then sacrificed on the afternoon before Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. The purpose of the sacrifice is for the expiation of the sins of the man as the chicken symbolically receives all the man’s sins, which is based on the reconciliation of Isaiah 1:18 in the Hebrew Bible.
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MY NOTE: what does Isaiah actually say?
1 The vision that Isaiah* + the son of A′moz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uz·zi′ah,+ Jo′tham,+ A′haz,+ and Hez·e·ki′ah,+ kings of Judah:+
2 Hear, O heavens, and pay attention, O earth,+ For Jehovah has spoken:“Sons I have brought up and raised,+But they have revolted against me. +
3 A bull well knows its buyer, And a donkey the manger of its owner; But Israel does not know me,* + My own people do not behave with understanding.”
4 Woe to the sinful nation, + The people weighed down with error, A brood of wicked men, corrupt children! They have abandoned Jehovah; + They have treated the Holy One of Israel with disrespect; They have turned their backs on him.
5 Where will you be struck next as you add to your rebellion? + The whole head is sick, And the whole heart is diseased. +
6 From the sole of the foot to the head, nothing is healthy. There are wounds and bruises and open sores—They have not been treated* or bound up or softened with oil. +
7 Your land is desolate. Your cities are burned with fire. Foreigners devour your land right in front of you. + It is like a wasteland overthrown by foreigners. +
8 The daughter of Zion has been left like a shelter* in a vineyard, Like a hut in a cucumber field, Like a city under siege. +
9 Unless Jehovah of armies had left us a few survivors, We should have become just like Sod′om, And we should have resembled Go·mor′rah. +
10 Hear the word of Jehovah, you dictators* of Sod′om. + Pay attention to the law* of our God, you people of Go·mor′rah. +
11 “Of what benefit to me are your many sacrifices?” + says Jehovah. “I have had enough of your burnt offerings of rams + and the fat of well-fed animals, + And I have no delight in the blood + of young bulls + and lambs and goats. +
12 When you come to appear before me, + Who has required this from you, This trampling of my courtyards? +
13 Stop bringing in any more worthless grain offerings. Your incense is detestable to me. + New moons, + sabbaths, + the calling of conventions +—I cannot put up with the use of magical power + along with your solemn assembly.
14 I have* hated your new moons and your festivals. They have become a burden to me; I am tired of bearing them.
15 And when you spread out your palms, I hide my eyes from you. + Although you offer many prayers, + I am not listening; + Your hands are filled with blood. +
16 Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean; + Remove your evil deeds from my sight;Stop doing bad. +
17 Learn to do good, seek justice, + Correct the oppressor, Defend the rights of the fatherless child,* And plead the cause of the widow.” +
18 “Come, now, and let us set matters straight between us,” says Jehovah. + “Though your sins are like scarlet, They will be made as white as snow; + Though they are as red as crimson cloth, They will become like wool.
19 If you show willingness and listen, You will eat the good things of the land. +
20 But if you refuse and rebel, You will be devoured by the sword, + For the mouth of Jehovah has spoken it.”
21 How the faithful city + has become a prostitute! + She was full of justice; + Righteousness used to lodge in her, + But now murderers. +
22 Your silver has become dross, + And your beer* is diluted with water.
23 Your princes are stubborn and partners with thieves. + Every one of them loves a bribe and chases after gifts. + They do not grant justice to the fatherless,* And the legal case of the widow never reaches them. +
24 Therefore the true Lord, Jehovah of armies, The Powerful One of Israel, declares: “Ah! I will rid myself of my adversaries, And I will take revenge on my enemies. +
25 I will turn my hand against you, I will smelt away your dross as with lye, And I will remove all your impurities. +
26 I will restore your judges as in the beginning And your advisers as at the start. + After this you will be called City of Righteousness, Faithful Town. +
27 With justice Zion will be redeemed, + And her people who return, with righteousness.
28 The rebels and the sinners will be broken together, + And those leaving Jehovah will come to their finish. +
29 For they will be ashamed of the mighty trees that you desired, + And you will be disgraced because of the gardens* that you chose. +
30 For you will become like a big tree with withering leaves, + And like a garden without water.
31 The strong man will become tow,* And his work a spark; Both of them will go up in flames together, With no one to extinguish them.”
———————————————————————————————–
Kaporos CONTINUED
The religious practice is mentioned for the first time by Natronai ben Hilai, Gaon of the Academy of Sura in Babylonia, in 853 C.E., who describes it as a custom of the Babylonian Jews with the practice also having been as a custom of the Persian Jews and further explained by Jewish scholars in the ninth century by that since the Hebrew word geber (gever) means both “man” and “rooster” the rooster may act and serve as a valid religious substitute and a religious and spiritual vessel in place of the man.
Kapparot was strongly opposed by some rabbis, among them Nahmanides, Solomon ben Adret, and Yosef Karo. They considered it a non-Jewish ritual that conflicted with the spirit of Judaism, which knows of no vicarious sacrifice outside of the Temple in Jerusalem. However, it was approved by Asher ben Jehiel and his son Jacob ben Asher. The ritual appealed especially to Kabbalists, such asIsaiah Horowitz and Isaac Luria, who recommended the selection of a white rooster as a reference to Isaiah 1:18 and who found other mystic allusions in the prescribed formulas. Consequently, the practice became generally accepted among the Jews of Eastern Europe. In the Shulchan Aruch, Rabbi Yosef Karo discouraged the practice. According to the Mishnah Berurah, his reasoning was based on the fact that it was similar to non-Jewish rites. Rabbi Moses Isserles disagreed and encouraged Kapparot. In Ashkenazi communities especially, Isserles’ position came to be widely accepted. The late 19th century work Kaf Hachaim approves of the custom for the Sefardic community as well. Some Jews also oppose the use of chickens for Kapparot on the grounds of Tza’ar Ba’alei Chayim (the principle banning cruelty to animals).
STOP
IN Leviticus 23:1-44 Jehovah continued speaking to Moses, saying: 2 “Speak to the Israelites and tell them, ‘The seasonal festivals+ of Jehovah that you should proclaim + are holy conventions. These are my seasonal festivals:
ALL OTHER HOLIDAYS ARE UNAUTHORIZED AND SATANIC FOR BOTH CHRISTIANS AND JEWS.
At the time of the interview, however, I had never heard of the American Free Press, whose interviewer called me in Brooklyn shortly after I arrived on September 30, 2014 from Virginia, for an impromptu phone interview about the Alliance to End Chicken Kaporos, which I and a small group of people, most of whom were/are members of the Jewish community, formed in 2010 as a project of United Poultry Concerns.
I first learned about the use of chickens in Kaporos from Jewish residents in New York City and Los Angeles in the 1990s. They urged United Poultry Concerns to intervene, because we promote the compassionate and respectful treatment of chickens and other domestic fowl.
Most members of the Jewish community in the United States had never even heard of Kaporos until animal rights advocates started drawing attention to it. No one in the Jewish community that I am aware of, apart from practitioners, defends the practice – quite the opposite!
I want to make very clear to anyone who visits this website that United Poultry Concerns, and I personally, reject individuals, groups, and forums that foster and facilitate animus toward members of the Jewish community or any other group of people. Our allies are people who promote social justice, civility and compassionate education. We extend our advocacy to all creatures who share the earth with us, and to the earth itself. We hope you do, too.
Thank you for your attention.
Karen Davis, PhD, President
United Poultry Concerns
Alliance to End Chickens as Kaporos
WOW!!!!! This article is so biased I will be cancelling my subscription before you start marching like Nazis. Lord!!!
An excellent history of the practice of killing and eating animals is a book titled “Beyond Beef” by Jeremy Rifkin. Many pagan peoples that converted to Islam, Judaism or Christianity held on to some of their old pagan customs. The torture, slaughter and eating of any animal is a throwback to those days. The sacrifice and cannibalistic consumption of human beings is also a throwback to those same old customs. For those of us who wonder why Biblical law is ignored by so many “religiously inspired” people, “Beyond Beef” is a great read.
And it is only a matter of time when the Talmudic “Jew” will slit the throat of any “goyim” children on his “holiday,” Yom Kippur. In fact, they have done it for centuries, here and there, openly and secretly.
They mock Jesus but these kinds of perverted actions belie their mockery and expose them as liars.
They do these kinds of things because while all year they can ignore the blood sacrifice requirement, on the eve of Yom Kippur they are desperate for true atonement.
They need to recognize that Jesus is the atonement and the sacrifice He left as His memorial is truly vegan: bread and wine as His sacred body and blood!
Isaiah 1:18 says nothing nor commands such a ritual. This ritual is not found anywhere in Torah or Tanakh. It is another made up ritual from rabbinic, not biblical, literature. Just like every other sacrifice commanded in Torah, it can’t be kept according to Torah because fake Israel has no temple or priesthood. Their religion is nothing but rabbinic traditions. AD70 put an end to true Torah sacrificial system and priesthood. And it will never and can never be restored.
When are we going to make these fanatics accountable for their deeds and bring them to justice? When are the good Christians, Jews and Muslims, et al. combine their forces and stamp out these evil fanatics?
It won’t happen, if we allow certain minority groups to get special treatment, bribe our politicians and law enforcement agencies to the detriment of the rest of humanity. To them, democracy is a joke and we are their goyims!
Animal and human sacrifices, throughout history have been utilized for the purpose of appeasing an arbitrary god or deity, in efforts of avoiding their wrath, or obtaining something from them, yet always at the expense of others. At this point my question is this:
“Is personal sanctification an act of amnesty by god that excuses one’s sinful condition through external ritual?”
The answer to this question is found in the “kind of person you believe God as.” Thinking Him arbitrary, exacting, vengeful and severe motivates ritualistic service from a heart of fear, ultimately producing the character of a rebel toward God and inhumanity with man. Having a proper perspective of God therefore is necessary but, salvation/sanctification is more than a scholastic endeavor, more than a memorization or knowledge of facts.
“Becoming like God in character involves the “internal” aspect of mankind, not external, and never apart from God Himself.”
This was the error in Eden when sinful man attempted to cover his transgression and nakedness with leaves. God on the other hand provided skins as clothing, without sacrificing animals for those skins. He created them and freely gave because of their need.
In summation then, God alone is the creator and benefactor of the human race. Salvation/sanctification is never achieved apart from Him with external ritualistic sacrifices; He (God Himself) is our sacrifice who by His taking upon Himself human flesh, sanctified it, and through death and resurrection, raised it to newness of life. Amnesty without change of character is never God’s will.
So then:
“Don’t be chicken.”
“Cease being HEN PECKED.”
“And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.” (Revelation 22: vs 17)
Union with Christ in His mystical body the Church offers healing unto all who come in faith. Here is the sacrifice given “once for all,” that transforms human nature into His likeness and image, apart from man’s intention and invention.
All of the Torah and Talmud is designed to make Jews into the most evil and blood-thirsty monsters on earth. But the “Jews are always innocent,” aren’t they, for their many crimes? Yes, they are “innocent” in their own minds because they put their sins on a scapegoat or a scape-chicken and “escape.” What could be more evil than killing something to make yourself “holy”? The Semites, both Jews and Muslims, kill so that they become “pure”? Really! The Semites are monsters.
The ritual appealed especially to Kabbalists, such as Isaiah Horowitz and Isaac Luria, who recommended the selection of a white rooster as a reference to Isaiah 1:18 and who found other mystic allusions in the prescribed formulas.
Where is god? Nowhere as usual! Sure as hell doesn’t care about chickens!!
Where in Isaiah is such a practiced mentioned? I have never read of such a thing in Isaiah.
The obvious infractions of health codes are indisputable. And if these people break them, then they need to be punished accordingly.
Furthermore, many of us are Jews fighting to end the use of chickens in this ritual and to promote the use of money, instead. Also, for all those who think this is horrible and unacceptable (which it is), please know that if you eat chickens, the ones on your plates suffered no less. Just look at the exposés all over the Internet to see how these birds are generally treated and killed on a daily basis. I would hope all who are upset with this practice will consider going vegan.
Rina Deych, RN/Vegan Nurse NYC
However, it must be clearly understood that the majority of Jewish people do not practice Kaporos, are appalled by it, and want it stopped. Chicken Kaporos is practiced by small segments of ultra-Orthodox Judaism, and while it is completely cruel, equally cruel toward chickens is the poultry industry. Our campaign against the use of chickens in the Kaporos ritual is part of our overall campaign to promote compassion for all creatures including an animal-free diet. Our motto is Give a Cluck-Go Vegan!
Thank you, Karen Davis, President of United Poultry Concerns and the Alliance to End Chickens as Kaporos.
The Talmud says “feed your animals before you feed yourself.” Most of these animals NEVER get fed. They are covered with excrement, blood, and pus from birds in crates above them. People who run these centers claim their flesh is donated to “the poor,” yet 1) if that were the case, the poor would be getting sick from eating birds who are sitting in a petri dish for bacteria (this also violates the mandate to protect one’s health), 2) such flesh from dehydrated, dying birds with broken wings is traife (unkosher), and 3) we have witnessed MOST of the dead (and DYING) birds thrown into garbage bags and then into dumpsters, violating yet another mandate not to waste. All that said, most of the practitioners do NOT believe they are hurting the birds. They are told since they are young (and actually believe) that birds are happy to do this for them and that when the birds are killed holy sparks will be emitted that will better the world (ridiculous to most, but far from intentionally cruel).
My grandfather, a kosher butcher, and his father, a shochet (ritual slaughterer), like Rabbi Karo, author of Shulchan Aruch (the Code of Jewish Law), called this a “foolish custom.” In a reissuing of the work, that commentary was removed, and that is the version followed by practitioners.
It’s time to get rid of this Medieval, Pagan custom. It’s more important to do Tshuvah (repentance), give Tsedakah (charity) and save one’s atoning for Yom Kippur. More and more Orthodox rabbis are speaking out the use of chickens in Kaporos both here in the U.S. and in Israel. Environmental Minister Amir Peretz in Israel is attempting to get this practice banned there.
This issue must be addressed on multiple fronts, including (but not limited to) education of the rabbis and community as well as legal action to address the many infractions of the law which, unknown to many, trump religious freedom. This year, the campaign to end the use of chickens in this ritual is gaining momentum. I believe we will ultimately be successful. But to generalize and demonize an entire group of people for the actions of a small minority, actions that (if the majority even knew about) would outrage most Jews is inaccurate and potentially counter-productive.
BTW, I am very, very much involved in the Stop using chickens as kapporos campaign; count Karen Davis as one of my colleagues and I rescue chickens.
Shanah Tovah and Tikkun Olam.
The cruelties we see today at kaporos centers are due partly to the whole factory farm system (the crates you see are what is normally used to ship chickens to the processing plants, where they are also abused before slaughter), and partly due to ignorance about animals in urban communities. But it is NOT required by the ceremony.
Halal or Kosher, take your pick, or circumcision, it is all barbaric and not necessary in the modern World.
Jews and Arabs are Semites and therefore both of them are practically Arabs.
This is how scum like Jeffery Dahmer and Charles Manson and other savage serial killers started. This is but one example of the bestial mentality of those subhumans and their ongoing genocide and murder for organ procurement of the Palestinian people. That “promised land” should be turned into a pile of rubble with no survivors.