Teshuvah, Tzedakah, and the Moral Evolution of a Jewish Tradition

After Shabbat ended, following Havdalah, I was told that I could perform kapparot in one of two places: on Avenue J near East 29th Street, or on President Street in Crown Heights.

I chose Avenue J simply because it was closer. At that point, my decision was geographical, not moral. I was not going there as a protester, and I had not yet decided to challenge the custom. I arrived prepared to perform kapparot with a chicken, as many Jews do before Yom Kippur.

Avenue J was crowded with people and cars. I expected to spend a long time searching for parking, but I found a space almost immediately, very close to the kapparot site.

At first, I simply considered myself fortunate. Later, I understood why that nearby parking space mattered: it brought me directly to the place where the birds were being carried out. I saw what was happening with my own eyes.

Had I parked several blocks away and hurried straight into the line, perhaps I would not have stopped to look carefully. But I was right there. I saw everything, and once I had seen it, I could no longer pretend that I had not.

Young chickens were being taken from their crates, lifted, and carried in circles over people’s heads. Their eyes were frightened.

According to the traditional practice, a man uses a rooster and a woman uses a hen. But these birds were so young that it was difficult to tell which were young roosters and which were hens. They had barely begun to live. The hens had not laid their first eggs. The young roosters had not reached maturity. Their natural lives were only beginning, and yet those lives were already about to end.

That was what struck me.

Before me was not merely a religious symbol or an object required for a ceremony. Before me was a living creature that was afraid and wanted to live.

The chicken knew nothing about kapparot. It had not committed my sins, spoken my hurtful words, or made my wrong decisions. It was innocent.

I looked into the eyes of those birds and felt that something did not add up.

As an Animal Chaplain, I cannot separate spirituality from the way we treat living creatures. If a religious act awakens mercy within us, it brings us closer to God. But if our desire for spiritual relief causes us to stop noticing the fear of a defenseless creature, then we must at least be willing to stop and ask ourselves a question.

A Custom, Not a Commandment

Standing there on Avenue J, I took out my phone and began reading about the history of kapparot.

I learned that killing a chicken for kapparot is not a commandment found in the Torah. It is not a Temple sacrifice, and it is not a prerequisite for receiving forgiveness on Yom Kippur. Written evidence of the custom appears in the early medieval period, during the age of the Babylonian Geonim.

More importantly, I discovered that the practice had never been universally accepted within Jewish tradition.

Great rabbinic authorities objected to it, including Ramban — Rabbi Moses ben Nachman — and Rashba, Rabbi Shlomo ben Aderet. In Shulchan Aruch⁠, Orach Chaim 605:1⁠, Rabbi Yosef Karo wrote that the custom should be prevented. Among the concerns was its resemblance to non-Jewish rites and to sacrificial practices outside the Temple in Jerusalem.

Rema — Rabbi Moses Isserles — defended kapparot as an established Ashkenazi custom. The Arizal later invested it with profound Kabbalistic meaning, strengthening its place in many Jewish communities.

Jewish tradition therefore preserved not only the custom, but also the dispute surrounding it. Traditional Jewish sources acknowledge both the objections of major authorities and the accepted option of performing kapparot with money.⁠

This was important to me. I realized that my discomfort did not place me outside Judaism. Long before I arrived on Avenue J, great Jewish sages had raised serious questions about this........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)