Kapporos Protests: Reflections on a New Approach

Note from the Editor: As readers of this blog know, I was a founding member of the Alliance to End Chickens as Kaporos in 2010, but broke with the organization in 2014 over what I saw as disrespect of Hasidism and Hasidic culture on the part of Karen Davis, who was their primary spokesperson at the time.  In the past year, however, some members of that organization have re-evaluated their aggressive approach (which, quite frankly, was not working) and decided to try using love and compassion instead.  In this guest column,  Rina Deych, also a founding member of the Alliance, describes what they did in the fall of 2018, and how it was received by the Orthodox and Hasidic Jewish communities in New York. (Rabbi Gershom)

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Kaporos Protests: Reflections on a New Approach

Guest Column by Rina Deych

Since 2010, the Alliance to End Chickens as Kaporos has been protesting the use of chickens in the custom of Kaporos (background info here.)  Although at times we did get into some great discussions with practitioners, interactions were often angry and contentious.   Last year, for the first time, we partnered with The Save Movement and Jewish Veg, and our approach was very different.

Compassion instead of anger

Author Rina Deych (left)
and Anita Krajnc 

Anita Krajnc, co-founder of The Save Movement, met with a group of us to promote a love-based initiative inspired by the writings of Leo Tolstoy.  It was a truly eye-(and heart)-opening experience to hear her speak.  She encouraged us to have love and respect for practitioners and to approach them from a place of compassion.

It made me remember a conversation I’d had with a friend who insisted that if she were brought up in a community that used chickens in the ritual she would “know” they were suffering and she’d refuse to do it.  I told her at the time (and mentioned when I spoke at our meeting) that no one can say that for sure.  I explained (to her, at the time, and later to the group) that if one is indoctrinated from birth to believe (or ignore) certain things, it’s very hard to change – especially when one lives in a community that reinforces those things. Therefore, difficult as it is, we need to feel compassion for these people.

Teaching a how to properly
hold a chicken by supporting
her body

Last Kaporos, we visited groups in Boro Park, Williamsburg and Crown Heights, Brooklyn, where the ritual was being performed.  Activists opened crates and gave food and water to as many chickens as they could reach.  Sadly, that wasn’t many, because they are so tightly crammed into crates that are stacked several high and many across.

A more positive response

I noticed almost immediately that the practitioners’ reactions to us were completely different than in previous years.  Children gathered around, wide-eyed with curiosity and both kids and adults were asking us questions.

Chickens drinking water
offered by protesters

Sage Max of Jewish Veg gave out flyers with historic information supporting the use of money (instead of chickens) in the ritual. There were activists showing practitioners the correct way to hold a chicken (under and around his or her body, instead of by their fragile wings).  One butcher (some of the rituals occur outside of butcher shops) with a long white beard came over to me and showed me that he was giving the birds challah (bread) soaked in water.  I was touched by his compassion and thanked him.

There were some angry words from practitioners, but we tried our best to respond to them with kindness.  This is what I call putting water on the fire.  In previous years, some of us have thrown gasoline on it… not intentionally, but in response to seeing the chickens suffering.   That approach was counterproductive and did not help the chickens.

Continuing postive outreach

This year, we plan to continue our feeding, watering, and outreach efforts.  We planted many seeds of compassion and this Kaporos we plan to water them.  I thank Rabbi Gershom for his wonderful book Kapporos Then and Now, which I have given to rabbis and some key members of the community to inspire them to use money, instead of chickens.  It has been an invaluable tool in helping to spread compassion.

Rina Deych
Founding Member
Alliance to End Chickens as Kaporos


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"Hasidic Man Speaks Out Against Mass Animal Sacrifice Kaporos" -- a video of last year's actions, produced by Donny Moss of  Their Turn. Note especially the outspoken young Hasidic man at the beginning of the video, who is protesting the custom.  It is important to remember that not all Orthodox Jews do this ceremony.


Also check out this well-written article by Donny Moss, about how the footage of the Hasidic man in the video came about, behind the scenes discussions with Hasidim who disapprove of using chickens, etc.  Very well-balanced, informative, and accurate.

For practical suggestions on organizing effective protests and other actions you can take, see Rabbi Gershom's activist manual online here. 

For more on Rabbi Gershom's Book, Kapporos Then and Now: Toward a More Compassionate Tradition, click here, where you can read a synopsis by the author and order copies at a discount.

Guest Column: "To Save a Life" by Rocky Schwartz

Editor's Intro: Each year I write a column about why I oppose using chickens for Kapporos, the pre-Yom Kippur ceremony practiced by some Orthodox and Hasidic Jews. I have written about it from the standpoints of history, of Jewish mysticism, of public opinion, of culture wars and politics.  In all of those stories, the chickens themselves were anonymous, suffering en masse in the background. This year, I received this story about one individual chicken whose life was spared at a Kapporos site, and the compassionate way that came about.  I was deeply touched by this true tale, and so I offer it to here, my readers. Perhaps seeing one chicken as an individual life will help you to see all of them as God's creatures, each with his or her own story to live. (Rabbi Gershom) 

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To Save a Life

by Rocky Schwartz

On a Monday night in October, we walked into hell. We had come to protest an Orthodox Jewish ceremony called Kapporos, in which chickens are slaughtered before Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.  Although I myself am Jewish, I am not Hasidic and did not grow up practicing Kapporos.

Kapporos chickens in a crate

On a busy street corner, men were grabbing six-week-old baby birds, flipping them upside down and slicing their throats. Behind them, a truck sat on the sidewalk, filled with crates stacked upon crates of more babies.

When I immediately began sobbing at the horror of the sight, a dozen little boys gathered around me, mocking and laughing. Someone shouted, "Kill it right in front of her!" He swung a young peeping chicken by her wings.

I was horrified that such young people could be so callous toward baby animals suffering before them. The adults present either did not see what was happening, or they did not care.

After I composed myself (read: put up all the mental walls so as to not truly see the reality in front of me), I joined about 50 activists who stood protesting the slaughter. Tensions ran high on both sides, but I tried to remain calm. I walked among those who were swinging the birds, telling them:

They feel.

They feel pain.

They want to live.

They are fighting for their lives.

*You* have a choice.

Some people responded, "Yes, I have made my choice," meaning that they had decided to have their bird slaughtered. I told them the birds didn't have a choice in having their lives taken from them. Most ignored or mocked me, but one young girl, maybe 12 years old, spoke with me. She told me her name was Rose, and said a lot of people were listening to us and and having their minds changed, even if they did not say so in public.  She herself was torn. Should she follow the lead of her parents or not?

I asked her if she would do it if the animals being used were cats or dogs.

"Definitely not," she answered.

I told her the birds are no different, that they, too, feel pain and fear. I showed her the background on my phone, in which I'm hugging my late love, a rooster named Tabitha. I told her he was my best friend, but he died in January.

"And tonight," I told her, you have the choice not to take someone else's life."

"But what do I do?" she asked. "I already have a ticket!"

A fellow protester named David instructed me to ask her to still use her ticket to get a bird, but give the bird to me after the ceremony, instead of having her killed.

"I'll give her a safe home," I assured her.

"Okay," she said, "I'll find you."

I returned to the group of protesters, hopeful but not optimistic that the child would actually return and give me the chicken.

To my surprise, only five minutes later a young figure ran toward me through the crowd and shouted, "Here!"

Rose the hen at about six weeks old,
soon after she was rescued

It was the same girl. She quickly pushed a live hen into my hands. Then we ran in opposite directions, she back into the crowd and I toward the safety of my fellow protesters Vanessa and Steven's car. As I ran, I called out a stunned "thank you," clasping the trembling, feathered body in my arms.

On the way back to the car, I hid the small survivor behind my protest sign, shielding her from the crowd filling the street, who were killing her kin. I was also afraid someone might grab her from me. Once in the car, the chicken continued to tremble in my lap, but slowly accepted gentle petting and some water. I decided to name her Rose, after the little girl who had spared her life.

While I was sitting in the car, my partner Jay spoke with the girl. He told her how brave she was and asked if she wanted to be an animal rights activist. She told him her parents are extremely protective, that she doesn't even have a cell phone or email address. She wasn't able to protest publicly, but she did care about animals. I wondered how many others in the crowd didn't want to kill their chicken, but were not as brave as this child.

Vanessa and Steve returned to the protest, managed to convince one more man to spare a baby rooster, and then drove us home.

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Rose today, as full-grown adult

Safe at home, Rose the rescue hen sits contented in my lap, preening herself and my arm. Out in the expanse of our backyard, she chooses to stand beside me. When I go to put her to bed at night, she cries out in panic and runs after me toward my bed, until I sit with her as she falls asleep.

She still bears the marks of the life she escaped. Badly infected feet from days spent in filth and crammed into a crate. A too-big body for a six-week-old, still-peeping chick, the result of over-breeding for the meat industry.  Anxiety from her history of trauma.

But she is one of the lucky ones. Though she was specifically destined to be part of a religious ritual, her fate was to be no different from the 263 baby chickens killed for food in the United States each second, an incomprehensible 52 billion globally each year. The only difference for her? She was seen as an individual. And a child had the power to save her life.

The author, Rocky, and her new friend Rose

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Editor's postscript:  Rocky refers to the birds being slaughtered as "babies."  These are not fluffy baby chicks, but six-week-old broiler chickens who have been artificially over-bred to grow and gain weight as fast as possible.  It is not that the Hasidim purposely choose to use babies as such; rather, it is that these are the type of chickens available from the meat industry.  The days of mother hens raising their chicks to maturity are long gone.  If you eat chicken, the likelihood is that the bird on your plate was also a juvenile bird hatched in an incubator and killed when only a couple months old.  They go to their deaths peeping in panic, never living long enough to cluck or crow. 

For more on this issue read my previous 2013 post, Kapporos Chicken's Don't Sing!  about the peeping chickens, and why Hasidim do not understand that they are crying. 

See also The Baal Shem Tov did it with a chicken, so why do you tell me not to? which explains this question from the standpoint of Hasidic mysticism.  

On Kapporos: The Baal Shem Tov did it with a chicken, so why do you tell me not to?

As has been my custom for the past few years, I am writing my annual essay against using chickens for kapporos, the atonement ceremony before Yom Kippur.  My previous articles dealt mostly with the history and philosophy behind the ceremony, directed at activists who were planning protests and/or educating themselves about the history and philosophy behind this practice.  This time around, I am going to address my fellow Orthodox Jews from within our own tradition.  (Although, of course, everyone else is welcome to read it as well.)

When I suggest to fellow Hasidim that we should no longer use chickens for kapporos, the most common answer I get is this:

"The Holy Ari did it with a chicken; the Baal Shem Tov did it with a chicken; the Rebbe did it with a chicken -- and weren't they holy people?  So why do you say it is wrong now?"

The 7th Lubavitcher Rebbe
making kapporos

My vegan friends would probably reply that killing a chicken is cruel, period, and that our ancestors were a bunch of barbarians for ever doing it in the first place.  However, that is not an answer that would satisfy us as religious Jews.  In fact, it is downright counterproductive, sometimes even antisemitic.  I believe our sages and ancestors were holy people, who were in tune with God and would never be intentionally cruel to animals.  So my Torah-based answer to the question is this:

Yes it is true that many of our greatest rabbis and teachers did kapporos with a chicken.  But they also treated the chickens with care and respect.  

They understood that chickens are living beings with feelings.   It is said that when the Holy Baal Shem Tov, founder of Hasidism, sharpened his knife, he moistened the stone with his own tears.  (Shivchei Ha-Besht) Our religion acknowledges that Eden was vegetarian, and that in an ideal world, this is what we would all be.  But this world is not Eden.  Eating meat was a necessity in Old Russia and Ukraine in the 1700s.  Before the days of year-round fresh veggies flown in from everywhere, being a healthy vegetarian was virtually impossible in northern climates.  So the Torah does permit slaughter.  But the Baal Shem Tov at least felt deep sadness that something had to die in order for the people to live.

  

Now look around you at the kapporos centers.  Is anybody weeping for the deaths of the chickens like the Holy Baal Shem Tov did?  

Probably not.  I have been laughed at and ridiculed by fellow Hasidim for saying that chickens have feelings.  One heckler even asked, "Do you really think chickens are smart enough to know what is happening to them?"  Yes, I do.  Modern research shows that chickens have an intelligence level at least as high as that of a three or four year old child.  Think about that next time you see a pre-schooler or bounce your own child on your knee.  That child is certainly aware enough to suffer pain, hunger, and fear of death.  And so is a chicken.  The Baal Shem Tov understood this.  His modern followers do not.

Yes, it is also true that the Holy Ari also did it with a chicken back in the 1500s.  But he, too, was sensitive to the suffering of animals.  Consider the following story: 

It happened one day in Sfat, Israel, that Rabbi Isaac Luria, the great kabbalist known as the Holy Ari (Ari-Hakodesh), ordered one of his students to leave him immediately.  The student felt terrible.  What sin had he committed to deserve this?  All that day he wept and prayed to G-d that his sins should not keep him banished from his Rebbe’s presence.

The next morning he came to the Holy Ari and begged to be told what wrong he had done.  The Holy Ari said,” It is because of your chickens.  Three days now they have been without food.  They cried out to HaShem and because of this, you have been under a ban (karet) from Heaven.  Now, if you promise to feed your chickens even before your morning prayers, I will loosen the ban on you.”  The student promised to do so, and the ban was lifted.  (From Shivchei Ha-Ari)

From this we learn how much HaShem our Creator, Who “has compassion for all the creatures,” cares about the suffering of chickens.  The student’s sin was tzaar baalei chayyim, cruelty to animals.  The cries of those starving chickens were canceling out his Torah learning and banning his prayers from reaching Heaven.

 

Now, stop and listen to the voices of all the hungry, thirsty chickens at the kapporos centers. 

Those are NOT the sounds of happy birds, they are NOT singing in joy at "helping us do a mitzvah," as some people have been taught to believe. You are hearing the anguished cries that chickens make when they are in fear and pain.   Last year (2013) thousands of chickens in New York kapporos centers died of thirst and hunger during a prolonged heat wave.  In previous years, chickens that were not sold by the eve of Yom Kippur were abandoned in warehouses.  There they spent our most holy day of repentance slowly dying of neglect.  Again, recall the story of the Ari and the chickens above.  How is this any different?

Are those sad cries rising to Heaven and canceling out your Torah and mitzvot, Heaven forbid?   Even worse, are they canceling out the prayers of the whole Jewish community?  

This is a very serious question.  We are taught in kabbalah that when we use the things of this world -- mineral, vegetable, or animal -- for serving God, then we elevate the Holy Sparks (netzotzot) within those things and effect a tikkun olam -- a repair of the universe.   This is a classic Hasidic teaching,  we find it in the writings of all our Rebbes, starting with the Baal Shem Tov himself.

But the reverse is also true:  If we do not use the material world with holiness and respect, the sparks are not raised, and we drag the world down.   Rebbe Nachman of Breslov said that if shechitah (kosher slaughter) is not performed correctly and with the proper kavannah (focused intention), then the sparks are not elevated, and we absorb negativity (klippot) from the life-force of the animal.  (See Likutei Moharan #37).

Combined with the story of the Ari above, I interpret this to mean not only the actual moment of slaughter must be proper, but also how the chickens are treated beforehand.  I am pretty sure that Rebbe Nachman would not have approved of using today's abused, starving chickens.

So we must indeed ask ourselves:  Is the mistreatment of chickens at today's kapporos centers elevating sparks, or is it blocking our prayers from reaching Heaven?

Portrait of Rabbi Israel ben Eliezer,
the Baal Shem Tov

There are many Hasidic stories about how prayers were being blocked from rising upward, usually due to some sin blocking the way.  The Baal Shem Tov himself once refused to enter a synagogue because it was so full of such prayers that there was no room for him to go in.  He said, "Those prayers are all dead prayers. They have no strength to fly to heaven. They are crushed, they lie one on top of the other, the house is filled with them." (Meyer Levin, Classic Hasidic Tales) 

So:  Would the Baal Shem Tov be able to enter today's kapporos centers?  Or would his entry be blocked by dead prayers that do not rise upward to Heaven?

Today we have hardened our hearts to the suffering of God’s creatures.  Kapporos chickens are crammed into small cages, shipped for miles in open trucks, stacked for days in hot warehouses without any food or water, then handled roughly like cheap  merchandise.  People stand around gossiping, while they carelessly hold the chickens by the wings as if they were nothing but shopping bags.  Dangling them this way is very painful for the bird, and can result in torn muscles and ligaments in the wings, because a chicken's wings are not strong enough to support its body weight.

This gross disrespect for living things is NOT the way our ancestors held chickens in the past.  All of the old drawings I have seen show the chickens being held upright by the legs, or supporting the body with their hands, as the Lubavitcher Rebbe is doing in the picture above.  This dangling them by the wings is a modern cruelty learned, most likely, from the factory farm industry.  (I have seen gentile farmers doing this.)

Such cruelty does not elevate the Holy Sparks!   It drags us down into sin.  You cannot commit a sin to do a mitzvah! 

Or a minhag, for that matter.  Any validity the ceremony might have had in the past is canceled out by the cruelty to the chickens in modern times.  Precisely because of how the chickens are transported and sold nowadays, many rabbis recommend using money instead. 

In addition, there is the issue of waste.  In the past, people often gave their kapporos chicken to a poor family as tsedakah (charity). This charity was part of the kapporos ritual, it completed the tikkun. 

"Repentence, prayer, and charity avert the evil decree."

Bags of dead kapporos chickens in
garbage truck, 2013

But today, the chickens often end up in the garbage. The reasons often given is that there is no time to kasher them properly, or that they were somehow injured or damaged and not kosher to begin with. Think about that.  In the past, families would take their slaughtered chickens home, to pluck and kasher them for the pre-Yom Kippur meal.  But in this day of shrink-wrapped meats, few people do that themselves anymore.  So the chickens are simply tossed into garbage cans.

That violates the prohibition against needlessly wasting something  (bal tashchit).  Last year, under several news articles about how these chickens were ending up in the city dump, there were numerous comments asking:  "Why didn't they give them to the homeless shelters?  Or the local soup lines?"  Such blatant waste of food while people go hungry is a shanda, a public disgrace that reflects badly on the Jewish people.  Here there are people going hungry, and we throw the chickens in the dump?  Where is the holiness in that?

Sickly, injured chickens crammed in a
cage, waiting to be used for kapporos.
These are not the happy free-range
chickens our ancestors used.

Even in the days of the sacrifices in the Holy Temple, the meat was never just thrown away.  On the contrary.  It was holy, and had to be eaten as a sacred meal in a place that was ritually purified.   And because the sacrifices had to be perfect specimens without any blemishes, the animals were no doubt treated very well before the sacrifice -- not like the factory-farmed, miserable, starving kapporos chickens of today.

As our Sages teach us, the world is like a set of scales.  Every good deed tips the world to the side of good, and every sin tips it to the side of evil, heaven forbid.   

Is the cruelty in today's kapporos centers canceling out our prayers on Yom Kippur?  Is it adding to the burden of sin in the world?

Again, these are serious questions.  Giving money to charity instead of using a chicken eliminates all these questions of cruelty and kashrut. You can avoid absorbing negative klippah energy into your life and that of your family.  You can be sure that the monetary value of the chicken really is going to the poor and not to the city dump.  You can be more certain that your prayers are not being blocked from rising to Heaven.  You can be sure you are making a real tikkun -- the act of charity that averts the evil decree -- and not contributing to the burden of sin in the world.

For all these reasons,  I feel it is time for us to stop using chickens for kapporos and give money instead.  

May you have an easy fast, and may you be sealed for a good new year!

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I have written a condensed one-page printable version of this article, suitable for a flyer or small poster.   Download the PDF here.   Feel free to print and hand it out, adding your own local contact info at the bottom.

See also: Kapporos Chickens don't Sing! -- my 2013 article on the misconceptions about chickens that you may hear at kapporos centers, etc.

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To learn more about this issue, get my new book, just out on June 4:  Kapporos Then and Now: Toward a More Compassionate Tradition available on Lulu.com.  Neither a vegetarian manifesto nor a "Torah-True" religious tract, I approach the issue as a combination of theologian, cultural anthropologist, and participatory journalist, offering numerous reasons why using money is a better option today -- but also critiquing both sides for both their strong and weak points.  WARNING:  Whether you are for or against using chickens as Kapporos, this book requires an open mind to read. 

Kapporos chickens don't sing!

Every year before Yom Kippur, a small percentage of the Orthodox Jewish community performs a ritual called kapporos (or kapparot, depending on your Hebrew dialect) in which a chicken is ritually sacrificed.  In recent years, there has been growing opposition to this practice, urging people to use money instead of chickens -- a stance that I support.  (See my 2011 blog article, The Kapparot Ritual: How tradition has become a travesty).

In this article, which will be my last on this topic for this year, I would like to address one particular quotation that got wide publicity in a number of articles in September 2013.  According to Rina Deych, a Jewish activist in Brooklyn who has been protesting the ceremony for years:

 "Every year I’d see little kids tell their parents, ‘The bird is crying!,’ and the parents would say ‘No, it’s singing. It’s happy to help us.'   I’d come over and tell them the kid is right.”

Having viewed numerous videos of kapporos ceremonies on YouTube recently, I would agree that the chickens are definitely not singing.  Nor are they very happy.  The call heard most often on the soundtracks is the incessant, shrill, high-pitched peeping of terrified, distressed half-grown chicks.

Kapporos chickens crammed in a crate. 

In many kapporos centers, the birds being used are not yet mature enough to crow or cluck.  They are factory-farmed, eight-week-old broiler birds, not even fully feathered out yet.  They are crammed into crates stacked on top of each other, often without food or water, peeping in miserable baby voices.   Most definitely, the children are right.  The kapporos chickens are crying.

The only time I ever hear that distress call among my own free-range chickens is if a chick is in trouble, perhaps separated from its mother or lost outside the chicken wire fence.  Normally, chickens do not constantly peep or shriek in those shrill, high-pitched voices unless something is seriously wrong.

Chavah and Freidl,
two kapporos chickens rescued in 2012
and now living happily in a sanctuary.
(Photo by Richard Cundari)

So why would the parents think the chickens are singing?  It seems hard to hear those peeping chickens and not know they are crying.

 However, most of the people doing this ceremony are urban Jews who know little or nothing about chickens.  Most likely, the only time they ever see or hear a chicken is at kapporos time, when the birds are all peeping in distress.  They never hear -- and probably do not even know about -- the 40+ different calls that chickens make in free-run flocks where they can express themselves in a natural environment.  So it is no wonder that people think the distressed call is normal.  They have no idea what a happy chicken really sounds like.

The next question concerns why they would say the chicken is "happy to help us."  This statement is more about Hasidic theology than chicken biology.  What I am about to present will probably seem strange, maybe even offensive to many readers.  And yet, this "happy chicken" statement is based on a kabbalistic belief that is central to Hasidic philosophy.   Understanding this POV is necessary for learning how to meaningfully dialogue with Hasidim -- a skill you will need if you ever want to convince Hasidic Jews not to sacrifice chickens.  So, my activist friends, I ask you to set aside your pre-conceived prejudices about Orthodox Jews, put on your multi-cultural hats, and follow me into the world of Jewish mysticism.

To understand why the parents in the Rina Deych quote would say the chicken is "happy to help us," we must go to kabbalah and a doctrine called "raising holy sparks."  Briefly summarized, it goes like this: The "holy sparks" are fallen refractions of the Original Light of Creation, which have descended into lower levels of the material world.  These "sparks" (or spiritual "energies") need to be mystically elevated back to their proper places in the universe. This process is part of what kabbalists call tikkun olam, or "repairing the universe."

Eating kosher food is therefore a sacred act that facilitates this process, provided that the proper blessings are said with the right focus and intention.   (For an in depth discussion of how this doctrine can be reconciled with vegetarianism, read and/or download this interview that Richard Schwartz did with me for his book, Who Stole My Religion?)

Based on this teaching, many Hasidim and other Orthodox Jews see meat-eating as an essential part of planetary healing, because it raises the souls of animals to a higher spiritual level which, in turn, elevates the energy of the entire universe.  I have many times been told that the chickens are hoping to be eaten by Jews at a Sabbath or other sacred meal, and thus have their own spirits elevated through this service to God.  I have also seen this explanation given in the Comments sections of articles and videos as to why the person commenting still eats meat.

And yet, this teaching is rarely, if ever, discussed among those activists who are trying to end chickens as kapporos.  Or, if it is discussed at all, it is only to put it down as, in the words of one activist to me, "a solipsistic conceit" to believe that humans have this kind of central role in the world.  This kind of judgemental attitude only hinders the dialogue.

So, before all you vegans out there go calling the Jews a bunch of medieval barbarians for believing in this teaching, let me remind you that there is a similar story in Buddhism, a religion that is widely upheld among vegans as the epitome of nonviolence.  And yet, Buddhists tell the tale of the selfless rabbit who offered to give his own body to a holy man as food -- and was rewarded by becoming Moon Rabbit, the "rabbit in the moon."  (Read the story here.)   Folktale?  Maybe.  But Moon Rabbit is widely believed to have been an earlier incarnation of the soul that would become the Buddha.  His story is told to Buddhist children as the epitome of self-sacrifice.

Native Americans (Indians) also have similar tales, such as the story of Jumping Mouse, who selflessly gave up parts of himself to help others, and was reborn as a eagle.  We should also remember the widespread custom among Native hunters of thanking the animal for giving its life so the people may live -- a prayer that is not unlike the traditional blessing said by Jews before slaughtering an animal.  In both Native and Jewish traditions, failing to treat the meat of the animal with respect is seen as a sin that can affect the well-being of the entire tribe or nation.  Among the Eskimos, it was widely believed that if one did not honor the spirit of the seal or fish that one ate, then the animals would not reincarnate and the humans would starve.

So, as we talk about the Hasidic belief in "raising holy sparks," please see it in the light of these stories from other, better-known (and often better respected) cultures besides Hasidic Judaism.  If you can honor the teachings of Buddhism and Native Americans, then at least try to understand similar ideas within Judaism.  In fact, the idea that animals might consciously allow themselves to be eaten in order to serve a higher purpose is very widespread around the world.

The positive side of these stories is that they all date from a time when people believed that animals have a form of consciousness or soul, and that they can make decisions about their fate. (Read Do animals have souls?, the most popular post on this blog, for an explanation of the soul concept in Judaism).  The ability to understand the language of the animals was attributed to Solomon and also to later Jewish sages and saints.  In Psalm 150, "everything that has breath" is praising God.  So clearly the ancient view among Jews and others was that animals have a form of consciousness.

The doctrine of "holy sparks" and other traditions mentioned here predate the French philosopher Rene Descartes, the "father of modern philosophy," who believed animals were nothing more than unfeeling machines.  It is the philosophy of Descartes -- not Judaism! -- that is most responsible for the insensitivity and abuses of animals we see today.  (Read my previous article on "animal souls" and Descartes.)

Unfortunately, the insensitivity of Descartes' philosophy has fully penetrated the Western World, including even the more isolated communities such as the Hasidim who use chickens as kapporos.  Thus, although the original "sparks" doctrine says that animals -- even those destined for slaughter -- must be treated with respect, the reality of today's meat industry makes that virtually impossible.  The parents who tell their children that the chickens are "happy to help us" in performing a ritual do sincerely believe this, but, at the same time, they are blocking out the suffering of all those chickens stacked in shipping crates without food or water.

Which brings us to the "down side" of the "holy sparks" teaching:  Just as it is possible to elevate energy through using the material world to serve God, so is it also possible to drag down the spiritual world through the misuse of the things around us.  The Ba'al Shem Tov ("Master of the Good Name"), founder of Hasidism in the 18th century, said:

Portrait of Rabbi Israel ben Eliezer,
the Baal Shem Tov

All things of this world that belong to man desire with all their might to draw near him in order that the Sparks of Holiness that are in them should be raised by him back to God... Man eats them, man drinks them, man uses them; these are the Sparks that dwell in the things. Therefore, one should have mercy on his tools and all his possessions for the sake of the Sparks that are in them; one should have mercy on the Holy Sparks. 

"Having mercy" does not mean we should never kill anything, and the Ba'al Shem Tov himself ate meat.  But he was also sensitive to animals as living beings.  He taught:

A worm serves the Creator with all of his intelligence and ability… A person should consider himself and the worm and all creatures as comrades in the universe, for we are all created beings whose abilities are God-given. -- The Baal Shem Tov (Tzava’as HaRivash 12)

Modern kapporos centers certainly are not "having mercy" on the chickens they sell and use for the ceremony, nor are they considering them "comrades in the universe."  Many have probably never heard these quotes from their founder.  It is doubtful in my mind whether the Baal Shem Tov himself would approve of the way these poor birds are being treated today.

As I explained in "The Kapparot ritual: how tradition has become a travesty," this is not the way things were done back in the days when Jews lived in small rural villages. and people raised their own animals.  Chickens were not raised on factory farms, trucked in for miles in open trucks, then left to go hungry for days on end.  Arguing that "they would be killed anyway" -- as some people do -- is no valid basis for treating them as if they are nothing but inanimate objects.  In fact, even inanimate objects (the "tools" referred to in the "sparks" quote above) should be treated with respect -- how much more so should one be gentle with living things!

"Raising sparks" is the Hasidic ideal, but today's attitudes often fall far short.  Some would condemn the whole culture for this insensitivity.  I place the blame on modern urbanization.  Since it is axiomatic that one cannot commit a sin to do a mitzvah, we must ask ourselves if the suffering of the chickens under modern conditions fails to raise the sparks and might even be dragging them down instead.  We must ask ourselves if the callousness often witnessed at these ceremonies is really the way a true Hasid should behave, or is it a goyishe attitude assimilated from the surrounding gentile culture.

I take the "holy sparks" teaching seriously, which is why I have devoted considerable energy to the question of whether or not it is being done properly.  Both in the above-mentioned interview with me by Richard Schwartz and this 14-minute video (below) that I posted on YouTube, I present arguments from within the Hasidic tradition as to why I believe "raising sparks" through eating meat is no longer possible under the conditions of the modern industry.  I encourage you all to study both of these resources, so that, next time you are told that kapporos chickens are singing in joy to "help us," you will know how to answer with respect and understanding.

UPDATE 2014:  I have written a one-page handout directed at Hasidim on the issue of not using chicken for kapporos. No, it is not vegan or even vegetarian, but it is not directed at vegetarians, it is intended for Hasidim and argues from within the context of Hasidic thought.  Download the PDF here.   Feel free to print and hand it out, adding your own local contact info at the bottom.

To learn how you can be effective in this campaign, get my new book, just out on June 4:  Kapporos Then and Now: Toward a More Compassionate Tradition available on Lulu.com.  Neither a vegetarian manifesto nor a "Torah-True" religious tract, I approach the issue as a combination of theologian, cultural anthropologist, and participatory journalist, offering numerous reasons why using money is a better option today -- but also critiquing both sides for both their strong and weak points.  WARNING:  Whether you are for or against using chickens as Kapporos, this book requires an open mind to read. 

See also: The Baal Shem Tov did it with a chicken, so why are you telling me not to? -- my answer to this Frequently Asked Question I often get from my fellow Hasidim.

Kapporos protests: What works and what doesn't

I have given considerable thought in the past few days about what works and what doesn't in the anti-kapporos protests.   As someone who is both a Hasidic Jew and an opponent of using chickens for kapporos, I'd like to offer some thoughts to fellow activists on how to be more effective in the future.

Hasidim viewing the anti-kapporos truck in Brooklyn, September 2013
(Photo copyright by Linda Obuchoska, used with permission.)

To being with, we need to remember that even among "the Orthodox," only a small minority do this ceremony with chickens.  There are over a million Jews in New York City, and, according to recent polls, 40% of them identify as Hasidic or Orthodox.  So even if 20,000 chickens were sacrificed, that is only 5% of the Orthodox community.  It is important to keep this statistic in mind, and not paint all religious Jews with the same angry brush.

In the same vein, not all of these guys are rabbis, either, even if they do have beards and dress in black.  This is standard dress for all Hasidic males, even total ignoramuses. Wearing the clothes is no guarantee of sainthood!  So please, unless you actually know that a particular person really is a rabbi, don't refer to him as such in your articles and blogs.  In many cases, the smart-alecks mouthing off across the barricades may be no more than teenagers acting out -- and every community has those!  (In some news photos they don't even have beards yet, proof positive that they are still youngsters.)  Not that I approve of profanity or sexist remarks, but it is usually not "the rabbis" making them.  And the guy slaughtering the chickens is probably not a rabbi, either -- just a butcher trained in kosher slaughtering.

So please, see the people as individuals, not a bunch of negative stereotypes, even if they do all look alike to you.   (If you saw me walking down the street and did not know I'm a vegetarian activist, what would you assume?)

Now on to the actual protests.  The video sound truck and matching posters used by the group in New York was a great idea -- very eye-catching  and educational, raising questions without insulting the Jewish community.   Putting up posters is a very common way to make statements in the Orthodox Jewish world -- in Jerusalem, the walls are covered with them.   In this video on YouTube and the photos on this page, you can see Hasidim stopping to look and read the posters as they scrolled by on the sides and back of the truck (Unfortunately, the sound in the video is not so good, so  I recommend viewing it in mute.)

Anti-kapporos truck in Brooklyn, September 2013
(Photo copyright by Linda Obuchoska, used with permission.)

On the other hand, out in Los Angeles there were signs calling it "murder," and comparing it with the Holocaust that I (and other Jews) found offensive.   Nor were the Jews at the kapporos centers completely innocent  of bad behavior either -- there were reports of Hasidic men making sexist remarks to women protesters and accusations of antisemitism on both sides.  (Read this post by a LA protester.)  All of which goes to show that shouting insults across the barricades is not a very effective way to change anybody's mind.

So let's take a look at what works and what does not, to improve effectiveness for next year.

If we look at the statements of rabbis who have said to use money instead of chickens, not one of them has called it "murder" or compared it with the Holocaust.   

In Jewish law, the word "murder" applies only to humans.  That may be specie-ist in your eyes, but it is the cultural reality.  If you call it "murder" this is heard as equating the life of a person to that of a chicken in a derogatory way.  Ditto for calling it a "holocaust" or a "genocide."  Judaism has laws against animal cruelty, but "murder" is not one of them.  Using that term only creates hostility to our message.

Not one of the anti-kapporos rabbis has said it is morally wrong to kill a chicken, either.  In fact, not all of them are even  vegetarians -- as for example, the CEO of the Orthodox Union, which certifies kosher meats, but who nevertheless said his org does not endorse kapporos with chickens.   So most of these rabbis probably eat meat, yet many have recently issued statements urging people to use money instead of chickens -- indicating that one does not have to be vegan to oppose this particular ceremony.

Here are some recent examples of statements by major rabbis:

The renowned Haredi kabbalist Rabbi Yitzchak Kadouri (died in 2006) writes that one should abstain from using chickens for kapparot due to “the cruelty to animals, which is prohibited by the Torah, and kashrut problems.”

Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach (1910-1995), a leading authority on Jewish law and head of the Kol Torah yeshiva in Jerusalem, also stopped using animals for kapparot, giving charity instead.

In 2010, Rabbi Steven Weil, CEO of the Orthodox Union of Rabbis in New York City, told the Alliance that the OU opposes using chickens as Kapporos due to the ritual’s “insensitivity” to the birds and the lack of historical foundation.

This poster of me and my rooster, Big Bird,
was featured on the truck and carried
at the protest in New York

 Rabbi Shlomo Aviner, Head of Jerusalem’s Yeshivat Ateret Cohanim, stated on video in 2010 that due to the animal cruelty, “It is recommended that one should conduct the atonement ceremony with money.”

Rabbi David Rosen, International Director of Interreligious Affairs for the American Jewish Congress and Former Chief Rabbi of Ireland, wrote: “Those who wish to fulfill this custom can do so fully by using money.”

Rabbi Shlomo Segal, Rabbi of Beth Shalom of Kings Bay in Brooklyn, states: “The pain caused to the chickens in the process of performing Kapparot is absolutely unnecessary.  Giving money is a more humane method."

In September 2013, the newly-elected Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Israel, David Lau, warned kapparot organizers that the failure to treat animals decently is a violation of religious law.

All of these rabbinic authorities have cited the cruelty and suffering of the birds under modern conditions as a violation of tsaar baalei chayim (the prohibition against cruelty to animals).  That is the most acceptable argument among Orthodox Jews according to Jewish law.  

We should take a cue from that and discourage people from using the words "murder" and "holocaust," and focus instead on the issue of cruelty in the ceremony as it is being practiced today.  (I do not mind the word "torture," though -- I use it myself.)  Remember:  the goal is to stop the use of chickens, so whatever argument works best is what we should use.

I know that vegans and other animal rights activists believe that slaughter of any kind has always been cruel, and they may be right.  But if protesters take this "all or nothing" approach, they get into the very sticky issue of whether the Torah itself is cruel because it allows meat-eating.  And if you say that, then Orthodox Jews will shut down and the dialogue is ended.  People will say things like, "Moses ate meat -- do you think you are better than Moses?  Do you think you are better than the Lubavitcher Rebbe,"  etc.  (I've actually had this argument used on me regarding vegetarianism.)

No rabbi is going to outrightly forbid slaughter or meat-eating, because the Torah permits it, and it is axiomatic that you cannot "forbid the permitted."  However, every person is free to choose for him or herself whether or not to eat meat or, in this case, use chickens in the ceremony.

So everyone in the "End Chickens as Kapporos" movement needs to stop and ask themselves:  Which is more important, to be politically correct in the vegan world, or to be effective in the Hasidic world where the ceremony is being practiced?

This why I have taken the approach of saying that the suffering of kapporos chickens under modern conditions cancels out any good the ceremony might have had in past centuries.    I often tell the story from the classic text, Shicvchei Ha-Ari, about how the great 16th-century kabbalist, Rabbi Isaac Luria, told a student that he had lost his place in the World to Come (Jewish equivalent of going to hell) for failing to feed and water his chickens properly.  The cries of those suffering chickens were canceling out all the prayers and Torah learning of that student.  I then point out that I believe the same thing is happening today with kapporos chickens, that the suffering cancels out the prayers.

This way, I do not condemn people's ancestors for having done it with chickens in the past.   I do not condemn Moses for eating meat or the Hasidic Rebbes (who are much more than a rabbi -- a Rebbe is regarded as a saint, somewhat like a guru) for having done it with chickens.  And I NEVER talk about how "customs can be changed" -- that is a secular approach that will be rejected as assimilationist heresy.  Assimilating into the secular world is seen as the greatest threat to modern Jewish survival.  Nor do I use satire with rubber chickens and such, because this is interpreted as antisemites ridiculing the Jews.

Instead, I focus on how you cannot commit a sin in order to do a mitzvah.  (And yes, they do regard this as a mitzvah.  In the Jewish world, a custom (minhag) often takes on the authority of law within specific communities.)  I also focus on the idea of voluntarily choosing not to use a chicken -- even though it is permitted by Jewish law -- as a personal khumra, an extra strictness that one voluntarily takes upon oneself.   Within the Hasidic world, taking on extra khumras as a personal discipline is acceptable -- even admirable! -- behavior that allows a person to make a humane choice without demanding that we "forbid the permitted."

Of course, these arguments take a lot more inter-cultural education and understanding than simply shouting "meat is murder."   It means being able to step into the other culture and respectfully dialogue from within its own worldview, even if you do not agree with it.  It means treating the "other side" with respect, even if you yourself are being reviled by them -- and perhaps remembering the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi:  "Make me an instrument of Your peace: Where there is hatred, let me sow love."  A stance that Gandhi would also agree with.  Nonviolence is not only physical, it is verbal as well.

So once again, we need to ask ourselves:  What works and what doesn't?

To learn how you can be effective in this campaign, get my new book, just out on June 4:  Kapporos Then and Now: Toward a More Compassionate Tradition available on Lulu.com.  Neither a vegetarian manifesto nor a "Torah-True" religious tract, I approach the issue as a combination of theologian, cultural anthropologist, and participatory journalist, offering numerous reasons why using money is a better option today -- but also critiquing both sides for both their strong and weak points.  WARNING:  Whether you are for or against using chickens as Kapporos, this book requires an open mind to read. 

See also "Kapporos Chickens Don't Sing!" -- another article by me, explaining some of the kabbalistic and cultural contexts of Hasidic beliefs that you need to understand in order to be more effective in your dialogues with Orthodox Jews.  One of the basic premises of any campaign is to know your target audience.  So please, take the time to educate yourself.

UPDATE 2014:  I have written a one-page handout directed at Hasidim on the issue of not using chicken for kapporos.  No, it is not vegan or even vegetarian , but it is not directed at vegetarians, it is intended for Hasidim and argues from within the context of Hasidic thought.  Download the PDF here.   Feel free to print and hand it out, adding your own local contact info at the bottom.

See also:  The Baal Shem Tov did it with a chicken, so why are you telling me not to? -- my answer to that question (which I frequently get from my fellow Hasidim).

The Kapparot ritual -- how tradition has become a travesty

Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, is coming soon, and with it comes the annual culture war over a ceremony called kapparot, in which a chicken is slaughtered just before the holy day.    The PETA and animal rights people will  be shouting "Meat is murder" while the Hasidic Jews who practice this ceremony will shout about antisemitism and accuse the activists of trying to shut down the whole kosher meat industry.  And nobody will really be listening to each other.  As a Hasidic Jew who is also a vegetarian, I understand both sides of the issue, and would like to share some suggestions for better communication.  (For basic background information on the history and meaning of the ceremony itself, see The Custom of Kapparot in the Jewish Tradition , by Dr. Richard Schwartz, Ph.D, and me.)

Respect, not insults, please

First of all, animal rights people, for outsiders to call any traditional culture "barbaric" or "medieval" or "primitive" or whatever never really works.  It only causes the traditionalists to circle the wagons.   And it goes without saying that sending nasty, obscene, anti-Jewish and/or personally insulting messages to various rabbis is not going to win any converts to your cause.  Would you stand outside a Native American (Indian) ceremony and shout about "primitive barbarism" because they wear feathers and furs?  Of course not, that would be "politically incorrect" now, wouldn't it?   So what makes you think it is any better to do it to the Jews?

If you yourself are Jewish but not Hasidic, please try to keep negative stereotypes out of the dialogue.  Even I, who am both a vegetarian and an opponent of using live chickens for kapparot, will get turned off if you start shouting anti-Orthodox epithets at me.  Stick to the specific issue at hand and don't go dragging in feminism, gay marriage, dress codes, Israeli politics, "who is a Jew" or references to the movie Yentl.  In other words, don't use the opportunity to dump on me everything you always wanted to yell at an Orthodox Jew.   I care about the welfare of chickens the same as you do -- even if I do dress funny in your eyes.  (In fact, all the pix in this article are of my own birds on my vegetarian, no-kill farm.)

Both sides would do well to visit the site of the Alliance to End Chickens As Kapporos, an org that has both Jews and Gentiles participating.  However, please be aware that the Alliance is sponsored by United Poultry Concerns, a  radical vegan org run by Karen Davis, who tends to mix in that agenda with the anti-kapporos campaign, to the point of not using any materials (including links to this article) that are not 100% vegan in approach.  In spite of this rather narrow dogmatic viewpoint, the org is doing some good work, and has an excellent set of reference links on their page.  Just remember:  You do NOT have to become a vegan in order to stop using chickens for kapporos!

Ridicule does not work

In a recent dialogue with an animal rights activist, he told me the best way to handle this would be to use rubber chickens to make fun of the ceremony ala Mark Twain, so that it would be rendered ridiculous through satire.  But that is exactly the WRONG way to go about it.  Most Hasidic Jews have probably never read Mark Twain (if they even know who he is) and won't see this as satire, they will see it as "a bunch of ignorant goyim ridiculing the Jews again."  If you really want to change minds and hearts, then you need to educate yourself first.  Learn how to respectfully dialogue from within the context of the culture and maybe, just maybe, they might listen to you.  Keep in mind that for the people practicing kapparot, it is a serious religious ceremony, even if you do not understand it.

Neither does playing the "antisemitism card"

On the other hand, my Hasidic brethren, it is unfair to judge the whole animal rights movement by a few nuts who send nasty messages to your email box.  PETA is not trying to shut down the entire kosher meat industry.  In fact, PETA has affirmed that kosher slaughtering, when done properly, is humane.  Animal scientist Temple Grandin, who has worked with PETA as a consultant on slaughterhouse issues, also affirms this.  The key words are "done properly."  Animal rights activists (including me) see this as referring not only to the moment of slaughter, but also to how the animals are treated before slaughter.  And we should also point out that it is not only secular activists who have concerns about using chickens in modern kapparot ceremonies.  Numerous Orthodox rabbis have also condemned it for various reasons of Jewish law.  (For a partial list of articles, see Orthodox Rabbis rethink chicken kapparot)



 From rural villages to urban communities

In order to have respectful dialogue, both sides need a bit of history first.  In the days when Jews lived in small towns (stetls), the kapparot chicken was a locally-raised bird slaughtered and eaten for the pre-Yom Kippur meal, same as any other chicken dinner.  (Chicken, at that time, was a luxury saved for special occasions like the Sabbath and festivals.)  A person would simply choose a bird from their own flock, or buy it from a neighbor, then walk across the village square, have it slaughtered, and take it home to be cleaned, plucked, and prepared for dinner.   In fact, the Shulchan Arukh (16th-century Code of Jewish law) says not to specifically seek out a white chicken (in reference to Isaiah 1:18, where "though your sins be scarlet,  they shall be white as snow") or pay more for it than usual, because this resembles the superstitions of the pagans (darchei ha-Emori).  Instead, people should use whatever chickens they already have on hand, the same as for any other meal.   This clearly indicates that raising and slaughtering chickens was an ordinary part of everyday life.


A mixed flock of chickens

The problem today is that most Hasidim are living in urban areas where live chickens are a rare sight, period.  The majority of urban Jews (even non-Hasidim) probably never see a live chicken except for this ceremony once a year.  These birds come,  not from local free-run flocks as in the old days, but from commercial factory farms located many miles away.  Nowadays the poor chickens are crammed into tiny cages so tightly they can hardly move, then piled onto open trucks, and driven to town, sometimes for days without any food or water.  In some cases, shopkeepers selling these chickens have left them out in the sun and rain for many days, again without food or water. 

Cruelty to animals is forbidden by Judaism

In Shivchei Ha-Ari, there is a story about Isaac Luria, the 16th-century Jewish mystic, telling a student that he had lost his place in the World to Come for failing to feed and water his chickens properly.  The cries of those suffering chickens were canceling out all the prayers and Torah learning of that student.   This is based on the general principle that one cannot commit a sin -- in this case, cruelty to animals -- in order to do a mitzvah (religious commandment, in this case, studying Torah.)   While Luria did approve of kapparot in his day, I find myself wondering if he would still give his approval under modern conditions.  I suspect not.  Trucking in factory farm chickens and mistreating them along the way nullifies any spiritual value in kapparot, and turns tradition into a travesty.

Humanely holding a chicken

The birds may also suffer while they are being handled for sale or during the ceremony, because many urban Jews are unfamiliar with the proper, humane way to hold a chicken while waiting in line.  Which should be by holding the bird upright, holding the feet to prevent kicking, and supporting the weight of the body -- as I am demonstrating in the photo here.  A chicken should not be held with the wings painfully pinned back, as is done at Rabbi Shea Hecht’s New York Chabad kapparot centers. 

I suspect that Hecht's method has more to do with not getting one's clothes dirty than with the comfort of the chicken.  Imagine somebody holding your arms behind your back and then suspending you by the elbows to get an idea what Hecht's method would feel like.  The feet of a chicken are made to support its weight; the wings are not.  The proper way to hold a chicken is to have the bird upright, holding the feet and tucking the body under the arm to control the wings if flapping is a problem.  

It's waving, not "swinging" a chicken


On the other hand, I must point out to the animal rights people that the chicken is not "swung"or "slugged" over the head (as is often mistranslated on the Internet lately), giving the wrong impression that it is whirled around like a pitcher winding up for a fastball.  Not so.  The chicken is gently waved in a small circle over the head, in imitation of a "wave offering" as was done over the altar in biblical times.  Older pictures and paintings of this ceremony, show the bird being held properly and waved in this way.  Continuing to call it "chicken swinging" for sensationalist purposes only makes you look ignorant and foolish to the people who actually practice this ceremony.  Plus, it might even mislead some Jews to think they are supposed to swing the chicken, which would be doing it wrong.  Again, if you want to change something, get your facts straight first!  (This article continues below the picture.)

This old engraving from the Middle Ages
clearly shows the chickens being held upright by the feet,
not dangled by their wings as some people do today.

Using money instead of chickens

 Using money for the ceremony instead of a live chicken has long been an acceptable substitute, and this is what I do.   So do many other Orthodox Jews.  An amount of money equal to (or better than) the value of the chicken is waved over the head and then donated to charity. 

However, Rabbi Shea Hecht, who is a major promoter of kapparot in the New York City area, doesn't feel he gets enough emotional kick out of using money.   "The main part of the service," he said in a 2009 MPR interview, "is handing the chicken to the slaughterer and watching the chicken being slaughtered.  Because that is where you have an emotional moment, where you say, 'Oops, you know what? That could have been me.' "

Frankly, this statement disturbs me deeply, for the following reason:  What kind of message are we sending to our children about Judaism?  And yes, there are children present at kapparot ceremonies.  Are we telling them, "If you don't behave, you could end up dead like that chicken"?  Are we telling them that Judaism is a religion of fear, that they should live in terror of God slaughtering them like a helpless bird if they step out of line?   Do we want them to harden their hearts against the suffering of animals?  I seem to recall a child abuse case several years ago where a daycare facility made kids watch a rabbit be killed.  How is this any different? 

It is well known than abuse of animals leads to abuse of people.  This was probably not the case with kapparot when raising animals for food was a part of village life, and seeing a chicken slaughtered was nothing out of the ordinary.  But nowadays, it is being done completely out of context, as a strange, scary, bloody ceremony meant to frighten us into obedience.   The majority of modern Hasidim not only do not raise chickens, they rarely keep pets or have any personal contact with animals at all.   Witnessing the slaughter of a kapparot chicken may well be the only contact with animals that these children have all year.  And they are not healthy, happy, beautiful birds like the ones in the pix on this blog.  Very often, they are sickly, scraggly birds with ragged broken feathers, half-starved  from being kept in "battery hen" cages. 

What kind of message does that send to our children?    Certainly it does not teach them that chickens are sentient, feeling beings with a social structure in their flocks, over 40 different calls, and the ability to pass learned behavior down to the next generation of chicks.  Nor does it teach them about the love a mother hen has for her chicks -- an image we sometimes use of God, who shelters us like a mother bird. 

The true means of repentance

 

The heart of kapparot for me is not slaughtering a bird for the shock value, but in repenting of my sins.  The Yom Kippur liturgy says that "repentance, prayer and charity averts the evil decree," So giving charity can nullify any bad karma coming to me from my wrong deeds.  Not only does killing a chicken not atone for my sins, it would seem that the cruelty involved in this ceremony nowadays compounds the sins I might already have, heaven forbid.

Some Jewish leaders have also felt that people would misunderstand the significance of the ritual. The belief that the ceremony of kapparot can transfer a person's sins to a bird, and that his or her sins would then be completely eradicated, is contrary to Jewish teachings.  For, if the ritual could remove a person's sins, what would be the need for Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement?  What would be the need for soul-searching and repentance?  Repentance does not come from abusing and killing a bird, but from a true change of heart. 

This is why, if you still use chickens for this ceremony, I ask you to have a change of heart this year, too.  Use money instead, and don't lose your place in the World to Come because of cruelty to animals.   Show mercy to God's creatures, as God shows mercy to you.  Treat the chickens kindly, and let them live.

See also my one-minute 2013 video, "Kapporos: A Heartfelt Plea For Mercy", produced by the Alliance to End Chickens as Kapporos.

To learn how you can be effective in this campaign, get my new book, just out on June 4:  Kapporos Then and Now: Toward a More Compassionate Tradition available on Lulu.com.  Neither a vegetarian manifesto nor a "Torah-True" religious tract, I approach the issue as a combination of theologian, cultural anthropologist, and participatory journalist, offering numerous reasons why using money is a better option today -- but also critiquing both sides for both their strong and weak points.  WARNING:  Whether you are for or against using chickens as Kapporos, this book requires an open mind to read. 

UPDATE 2014:  I have written a one-page handout directed at Hasidim on the issue of not using chicken for kapporos. No, it is not vegan or even vegetarian , but it is not directed at vegetarians, it is intended for Hasidim and argues from within the context of Hasidic thought.  Download the PDF here.   Feel free to print and hand it out, adding your own local contact info at the bottom. 

  

A free-range rooster named Star takes
a walk on my Minnesota hobby farm.