The Chumra Of The Day

My late father in law ["late" not because of his tardiness but because he dwells on Har HaMenuchos] used to come visit my family on Erev Shabbos. He would walk into my house and with a twinkle in his eye he would say "So Allan [he insisted on calling me Allan. That's how the American government knows me as well. May Obama lose the next election and I will once again be proud of my American passport], what's the chumra of the day?" All in good humor. So li'ilui nishmaso, I will share a chumra.

Ready?

Not to drink milk or eat milk products, even chalav yisroel and even if the carton has yiddish writing on it.

Where does that crazy idea come from???

Very simple. Research has shown that about 30 percent of the cows in any given herd are trief [meaning that they have some hidden blemish that will shorten their life-span] and therefore their milk is not kosher. When their milk is mixed with the kosher cows milk the necessary ratio to nullify the unkosher milk would be 60 to 1. One doesn't have to have a post-doc from M.I.T. [The Monsey Institute of Talmud] to figure out that 70 percent against 30 percent is nowhere near 60 times. Ergo [I don't think I've ever used that word in a regular sentence and I am probably misusing it. But I often note that my high school english teacher is dead so I am free to make as many mistakes as I choose. I make liberal use of this freedom. And may her soul rest in more peace than I gave her on earth], when we mix all the milk together, everything becomes "treifed up".

Uh Oh!

Not so crazy sounding anymore.

Hope you like meat.

And pareve.

Solution for lovers of Ben and Jerry: There is a rule that we follow the majority. This means that if the majority of cows are kosher, when we look at each individual cow we say to her "Cowee - you are kosher". So, yes, we are not oblivious to the fact that any given cow might be treif but since we have the biblical mechanism to follow the majority, we are able to Kasher every individual animal. So it emerges that we no longer have a ratio of 70 to 30 but of 100 to none in favor of kosher cows.This religion is GREAT!! Note - Not everybody accepts the aforementioned solution and they insist that we still remain with a minority of unkosher cows and since all the milk is mixed together we view it as a majority of kosher milk and a minority of unkosher milk, rendering the whole thing [due to the insufficient amount of kosher milk necessary to nullify the unkosher milk] trief. They drink coffee without milk. They don't eat Ice Cream. They are heroes of self control!

One last question - How do those Israelis get the milk to penetrate those sealed bags??

A wonder!!