The Trayfing of Hummus
Ynet reports,
An influential Israeli rabbi has ruled that a key ingredient in hummus is not kosher when prepared by non-Jews, his top aide said, presenting a religious challenge to followers who savor the Mideast staple.
The ruling regarding tahini sesame seed paste sent Israeli hummus companies scrambling to check their production processes. Some feared that the ruling would affect sales of the chick pea spread that many Israelis consider the national food.
[…] A former chief rabbi, Mordechai Eliahu, ruled that when sesame seeds used to make the tahini paste for hummus are roasted and shelled by non-Jews, the resulting hummus is not kosher, said the aide, Rabbi David Lahiani.
When non-Jews are involved in the cooking process of foods, this causes them to be designated non-kosher according to Jewish law, Lahiani said.
Meir Micha, chief of Pinati hummus company, said publication of the ruling Sunday sent him hurriedly calling all his factories to ensure that the production process was kosher.
[…] Micha said he thought Eliahu’s ruling was only due to a dispute between religious camps. Eliahu’s main rival, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef – himself a former chief rabbi – told a newspaper there is no difference between shelled and unshelled sesame seeds, and they’re all kosher.
This story is a few months old and gets picked up by secular papers every now and then, presumably because it makes religious people look so petty.
But the story didn’t even crack the haredi papers because virtually no one believes there is an actaul issue here.
So if I buy a “kosher” product from a non-jew is it still kosher?? Aeh… everything`s made by chinese people anyways…
bishul akum…..
thats the problem here…. and it could only be for sefardim who are more strict on this halacha usually requiring a “bet yosef” level of bishul… (cooked until edible by a jew)
This story is a few months old and gets picked up by secular papers every now and then, presumably because it makes religious people look so petty.
just petty? it makes them look like superstitious, bigoted idiots. oh – wait a second, it doesn’t take tahina to do that.
this is why 90% of jewry doesn’t listen to “rabbis.”
No novelty here, it’s in the Talmud too.