To be Kosher food must be certified by an appropriate organization. If it is not certified, it is not kosher. On Dec 5, 2003, at 3:32 AM, bonham15 wrote: > > one thing about 'kosher'. its a hell of a good way to secure the > supply of > your food... i don't mean in the economic sense of a plentiful food > supply, > i mean in the sense of you've got a reasonable idea of how your food > gets to > you, and who has handled that food and under what conditions. also, i > happen to like the taste of kosher salt more than normal table salt. i > think its because its basically sea salt. i could be horrifically wrong > though, but that hasn't stopped me from charging blindly ahead in a > fit of > ignorance before though. > > andy > > i think my favorite one was someone asking me if the krispie kreme > donuts i > sell were kosher... how in the hell should i know? > > >> On Fri, 5 Dec 2003, Matthew Hunter wrote: >> >>> Consider one of the most ancient (known) bodies of "tradition" in >>> our history, that of Judaism. There are many elements of the >>> Jewish tradition that are wholly practical; I shall put forth >>> kosher food as an excellent example. Nowadays, we can look at >>> the traditions concerning kosher food and understand that food >>> prepared in that specific way was less prone to disease or >>> spoilage than foods prepared in other ways. (I don't know enough >>> about kosher to give any really good examples). >> >> >> I think this is arguable - most things appear (from a secular >> perspective) >> to be considered unclean because they don't fit someone's category of >> what's natural in terms of scales or foot structure - maybe pigs with >> trichinosis were worth avoiding, and maybe milk has some bad chemical >> reaction with beef on wooden plates, I don't know - or squeamishness >> about >> blood. To me the greatest advantage of these laws was that it set the >> community apart from their neighbors, as did circumcision. This >> separation probably brought a lot of persecution but a lot of >> cohesion as >> well. >> >> On the other hand, maybe G*d thinks it's bad to eat rabbits and >> scallops >> and llamas, as well as golden retrievers, and maybe G*d wasn't clear >> about >> swordfish because He hadn't thought about it. >