What is Jewish law regarding eating cheese and bread and other foods that were made by non-Jews but don't seem to have any non-kosher ingredients on the ingredient list? What if they have no hechsher?
1. There are actually four questions being posed here:
a. What are the kosher supervisions required for bread?
b. What are the kosher supervisions required for cheese?
c. When are kosher supervisions not needed?
d. How much kosher supervision is politics and how much is religion?
2. What are the kosher supervisions required for bread?
a. This rarely studied Tractate examines the permissibility of permitting food to poor people who need to eat that satisfies all of Biblical Koser standards but may be suspect with regard to some rabbinic standards.
b. mDemai 5:4 permits taking and eating bread from the non-Jewish baker, palatir in Greek and paltar in conventional pronunciation. See also bAvoda Zara 35b, where the anonymous Talmud [the setam] reflects both leniency and discomfort with the leniency, which is why many Jews eat only Jewish bread.
c. Maimonides, Tithes, 14:6 codifies the Mishnah’s rule because the professional non-Jewish baker has a professional reputation to maintain and will be truthful regarding his/her baking handiwork.
d. This leniency is restricted to baking; non-Jewish cooking [bishul akkum] and unattended meat [basar she-nit’allem min ha-’ayin] do not carry this specifically legislated leniency.
e. With clarity and brevity, Shulhan Aruch 112:1-2. both codifies and clarifies the statute, maintaining:
i. The sages forbade the eating of non-Jewsih bread to avoid intermarriage, as breaking bread can lead to breaking the Torah covenant.
ii. R. Isserles appropriately adds that the law applies as an act of legislation even if the reasons for that legislation no longer apply.
iii. The restriction applies to the five grains of which bread [and matsa] are made, i.e., wheat, rye, barley, oats, and spelt.
iv. The restriction of non-Jewish cooking [not baking] only applies if the food is served at state dinners, i.e., “the kings’ table.” Rabbi Moshe Tendler teaches that this phrase not be taken literally and refers to any fancy feast.
v. According to the Sefardic reading, which takes the setam of bAvoda Zara 35b at face value, the dispensation to allow non-Jewish bread only applies, in emergency situations, as per Tractate Demai and Maimonides, Dissenters [Mamrim] 2:4.
vi. According to Ashkenazi practice, one mat rely on kosher non-Jewish bread bakers even when Jewish baked bread is available.
vii. Practically, we buy Italian bread after Passover because this bread never has non-kosher ingredients.
viii. When serving on a Kashrut committee in New Jersey, I supported the Chabad request to make Jewish bread available but opposed their request to make Jewish bread the required Jewish Orthodox standard because while accommodation is proper, the claim that Jewish bread is a higher religious standard is neither manifest [albeit plausible] in the Talmud nor codified by the Askenazi Rabbi Isserles.
3. What are the kosher supervisions required for cheese?
a. bHullin 116b teaches that according to thoe Babylonian Amora Samuel, that the enzyme producing stomach of the kosher animal that was slaughtered by a non-Jew is nevelah, i.e., not kosher, and he also maintains [a] there is a rabbinic decree [b] outlawing non—Jewish cheese [c] the cheese coagulates in the skin of the stomach, a necessary and therefore not nullifiable component of the cheese.
b. By law, the cheese of non-Jews is not kosher by rabbinic decree; therefore according to normative law even if the cheese coagulates because of a vegetable gum base, the decree is in force.
c.Maimonides maintains [Laws of Forbidden Foods 3:16]:
i. While non-Jewish milk may not be consumed by a Jew because the kosher animal milkmay have been mixed with non-kosher milk, since milk of non-kosher species does not coagulate, the sages did not make in that instance a restrictive decree.
ii. Even though the coagulating enzyme’s presence is negligible, since its presence indeed makes the cheese hartd, or stand, it cannot be considered inconsequential.
iii. Some rabbis disallowed non-Jewish cheese because the decree is legally and syntactically generic, and this seems to be Maimonides’ view which seems to me to be the most logical reading.
iv. Violating this rabbinic view incurs the “lashes of rebellion,” imposed for the violation of rabbinic decreees.
v. Some restrict and some allow non-Jewish butter. But for Maimondes, non-Jewish milk is absolutely forbidden.
d. Rabbi Moses Feinstein: Iggarot Moshe YD 4:5
i. We may rely on government inspection to ascertain that we are buying cow milk, obviating Maimonides’ concern.
ii. Some people will remain strict
e. Rabbi Ovadia Yosef writes that feeding children rabbinically restricted non-kosher cheese because difficult economic conditions may be justified because R. Jacob Tam [Avoda Zara loc cit] argues that thre is nothing materially unkosher and if the reason for the decree does not apply, the decree to his view would not.
f. While finding Maimonides’s view more convincing, in dire circumstances rabbinic law may be waived and R. Tam’s position maoy be adopted.
4. When are kosher supervisions not needed?
Since nullification of negligible particles of forbidden food may be done only after the fact, all processed foods should carry a recognized Kosher endorsement. Unsupervised foods may indeed be kosher but, given food chemistry what it is, we need the watchful eyes of paid professionals whose salaries are not paid fior the supervision, so the endorsement cannot be “bought” for a fee. Be wart of one man for fee supervisions, because no one watches the watcher. I am not saying they cannot be reliable; I am saying that kosher food industry require book learning, apprenticeship, and accountability. When confronted with special situations like hunger, expert rabbis can often find humane solutions.
5. How much kosher supervision is politics and how much is religion?
Because there are disreputable for profit private certifications—and I have encountered more than a few, a few—the responsible supervisions often apply safety kosher standards in order to avoid impugning their reputations. For example,
1. although Ashkenazi practice does not require glatt one hardly cannot find non-glatt supervisions today that are really reliable.
2. dairy equipment production is treated as full fledged dairy food. Now by law, and observant Jewish tastrr could examine the food but this leniency is not used.
3. YD 95:3 would permit one dishwasher for meat and milk if there is a substance like dirt or soap that would degrade the edibility of the refuse, but latter day rabbis want to be more strict.
Kosher is serious business and is not a folkway, custom or ceremony, it is the life and length of days of the Jew who hears God’s connecting, commanding and cajoling voice in the Torah. For a logical, letter of the law guide to an apolitical approach to the Kosher laws, see Rabbi Isaac Abadi at www.kashrut.org.
The believing Jew first gets Kashrut right. And with learning and time, kashrut gets easy..
