Last update - 00:00 18/09/2007
Court rules 'kapparot' ritual violates animal slaughter laws
By Amiram Cohen and Yair Ettinger, Haaretz Correspondents
A Petach Tikvah court on Tuesday ruled that the ritual slaughter of chickens for the Yom Kippur "kapparot" ritual is a violation of state regulations on animal slaughter.
The court adopted the matter after a resident of Ramat Modiin was caught by agriculture ministry officials with dozens of slaughtered chickens in his possession without the required permits for animal slaughter.
The man refused to pay the fine police gave him, and demanded a trial to clear his name.
During his trial, the court ruled against the defendant, and issued a penalty of NIS 2,700 or 17 days imprisonment.
Shas movement spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef recently stated he is worried about unsupervised slaughter of chickens as part of the kapparot ritual ahead of Yom Kippur.
The ancient ceremony involves swinging a live chicken overhead in a ritual transference of the person's sins in preparation for the day of atonement. It may be performed anytime between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
Speaking last Saturday at his Jerusalem synagogue, Hayazdim, Yosef warned that overworked ritual slaughterers wind up using flawed blades that are not deemed "perfectly sharp."
"If it is not perfectly sharp, it is not only non-kosher but nevela," he said, using the term for the carcass of a kosher animal not killed in accordance with Jewish law and therefore forbidden for consumption.
Despite the modern custom of using money in place of chicken and then giving it to charity, many ultra-Orthodox Jews continue to use chickens and slaughter them before giving the kosher meat to charity.
American rabbis also have expressed reservations about the proper slaughter of these animals, prompted by a complaint to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. A report by PETA about cruelty toward chickens before Yom Kippur led a group of Hasidic rabbis to discuss reducing the animals' suffering. The U.S. edition of the Orthodox publication Hamodia ran an editorial calling for greater supervision of the slaughter.
Yosef said that Rabbi Joseph Caro "is against this thing," citing the author of the Shulhan Arukh, or Code of Jewish Law, who considered kapparot a pagan ritual. However, Yosef refrained from banning the custom. He made do with calling on those who wish to perform the ceremony to do so early to prevent overloading the ritual slaughterers, and "also to go to God-fearing slaughterers who are kosher."
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