By Michael R. Mantell, Ph.D.
SAN DIEGO — It was a rainy day in Manhattan. Trust me. I know. I got drenched. I did have an umbrella. Until I put it down in a trusted kosher restaurant in New York City, turned to place my order at the counter and in the “New York minute” it took for my tuna sandwich, potato knish and Dr. Brown’s Cream Soda to be ready, my umbrella was gone. Vanished into the rain of a post-holiday, very cold, Rockefeller Center.
Have you ever looked for a needle in a haystack? Well, searching for your misappropriated umbrella on a rainy day in New York is the equivalent. Besides, what was I going to say to this kosher thief, “Excuse me, but by any chance were you eating that corned-beef sandwich next to me back there at the so-and-so restaurant, and is that my umbrella you’ve got there?”
In Judaism there is a mitzvah, a commandment, that says if someone finds a lost object he is required to return it to it’s owner. This is called the mitzvah of Hashovas Aveidah – the commandment to return a lost object. HaShem tells us this mitzvah twice in the Torah, once in Shemos (Exodus) 23:4, “If you come across your enemy’s ox or donkey going astray, bring it back to him.” (The Torah talks about your enemy’s ox to stress that it is a mitzvah to return a lost object even if the owner is your enemy) and once in Devarim (Deuteronomy) 22:1-3, “If you see your brother’s ox or sheep going astray, you must not ignore them, you must return them to your brother. If your brother is not near you, or if you do not know who [the owner] is, you must bring it home and keep it until your brother identifies it, whereupon you must return it. You must do the same to a donkey, an article of clothing, or anything else your brother loses and you find, you must not ignore it.”
This mitzvah is not only for lost objects. Any time you see that a fellow Jew stands to suffer a loss you are required to take action to prevent this. I guess nobody looked up from their mouth-watering kosher lunch to notice someone else walking out with the umbrella I placed next to my table.
Lost objects? I didn’t lose my umbrella. I knew exactly where I placed it. No, it wasn’t lost. It was stolen. So if there is this mitzvah covering lost objects, how much more so is there one for theft? After all, isn’t “Thou Shalt Not Steal” one of the big ones?
So what about my umbrella? Didn’t the corned-beef eating thief know this mitzvah? And in a kosher restaurant no less! I mean, shouldn’t I expect more? After all, Kashrut is the body of Jewish law dealing with what foods we can and cannot eat and how those foods must be prepared and be eaten. “Kashrut” comes from the Hebrew root Kaf-Shin-Resh, meaning fit, proper or correct. It is the same root as the more commonly known word “kosher,” which describes food that meets these standards. The word “kosher” can also be used, and often is used, to describe objects that are made in accordance with Jewish law and are fit for ritual use. Sometimes we use the word “kosher” to describe proper behavior.
Stealing an umbrella on a rainy day in New York is definitely not kosher. No matter how you slice the corned-beef, stealing umbrellas on rainy days just isn’t “kosher.” Come to think of it, stealing umbrellas on any day is not “kosher.”
The short answer to why Jews observe laws of kashrut is: because the Torah says so. The Torah does not specify any reason for these laws, and for a Torah-observant, traditional Jew, there is no need for any other reason. Some have suggested that the laws of kashrut fall into the category of “chukkim,” laws for which there is no reason. We show our obedience to G-d by following these laws even though we do not know the reason. Others, however, have tried to ascertain G-d’s reason for imposing these laws.
In his book To Be a Jew (an excellent resource on traditional Judaism), Rabbi Hayim Halevy Donin suggests that the “kosher” dietary laws are designed as a call to holiness. Holiness. The ability to distinguish between right and wrong, good and evil, pure and defiled, the sacred and the profane, is very important in Judaism. Imposing rules on what you can and cannot eat should ideally ingrain that kind of self-control, requiring us to learn to control even our most basic, primal instincts. Like not stealing my umbrella!
Donin also points out that the laws of kashrut elevate the simple act of eating into a religious ritual. The Jewish dinner table is often compared to the Temple altar in rabbinic literature. A Jew who observes the laws of kashrut ideally cannot eat a meal without being reminded of the fact that he is a Jew.
Ideally. In real life though, it often works differently. In my case, whomever took my umbrella may well have eaten his meal in holiness, and then, after he made the proper blessings over the meal he enjoyed, stole my umbrella.
Randy Cohen, the New York Times ethicist writer, in a recent book on ethics, posed the following question as a part of his lengthier ethics test:
One rainy evening I wandered into a shop, where I left my name-brand umbrella in a basket near the door. When I was ready to leave, my umbrella was gone. There were several others in the basket. Should I have taken a similar name-brand umbrella, taken a lesser quality model, or just gotten wet?
- a similar name-brand umbrella
- a lesser quality model
- just gotten wet
Imagine that this is even a question. But times have changed. On Saturday, June 30, 1861 – that’s right 1861 – it was reported in Britain’s The Age newspaper, “Ah Tee, found guilty of stealing an umbrella from the shop of Clarke and Bedford, Great Collins street, was sentenced to two months’ imprisonment. The prisoner pleaded that, though he ran away with the umbrella, he intended to pay for it, but that he could not find the shop man.”
The Torah not only demands that we observe the laws of kashrut and that we sanctify all our physical indulgences, it also insists that we sanctify all aspects of our relationships with others. Including not stealing someone’s umbrella. Traditional Judaism teaches that we must apply all the tenets of justice and righteousness with painstaking care when we deal with others, avoiding even the slightest trace of dishonesty. In the course of any business transaction, for example, it is very easy to err with small sums of money, so one who wants to avoid dishonest money must constantly be wary. Rav Yosef Breuer zt”l stressed that, in orthodox Judaism, just as food should be Glatt Kosher, our financial dealings should be Glatt Yosher (uncompromisingly straight). Stealing someone’s umbrella is not uncompromisingly straight.
The shochet (ritual slaughterer) of the city of Salant once approached Rav Yisrael Salanter for advice; he was contemplating leaving his profession to become a shopkeeper. When Rav Yisrael asked him what had prompted this idea, he replied that he was afraid of the great responsibility he bore for slaughtering the meat properly. Rav Yisrael was shocked at his response, and told him that if that was his concern, he definitely should not open a shop. A shochet only has to worry about the transgressing the laws of “kosher” meat, while a storekeeper must concern himself with the countless possible transgressions that involve other’s money – and their umbrellas too.
Oh well. Who said any of us are perfectly consistent? None of us are, to be completely honest. We all, Orthodox-Conservative-Reform, pick and choose our personal mitzvot. Besides, saving another’s life is more important than any other mitzvah. I hope whomever is using my umbrella, at least, didn’t catch the cold I did out there in the rain of New York City. Achoo.
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Mantell is author of the recently published 25th Anniversary Edition of his 1988 original, Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff — PS It’s All Small Stuff. To purchase a copy, connect to Amazon by clicking on the picture of his book on the right hand panel. Comments on the above column may be placed in the box provided below or you may contact the author directly via michael.mantell@sdjewishworld.com