A Soulful Journey

The late Rabbi Richard Israel once wrote a book titled “The Kosher Pig.” The intriguing title stems from a story he tells about a pious Jew who was told by his doctor he had a rare disease that could be cured only by eating pork. Now, Jewish law states that in order to save a life, virtually any of the law’s requirements can — in fact must — be broken. But that wasn’t enough for this man. He determined the pig had to be slaughtered in the kosher way, painlessly, before he ate it. So he brought the pig to the local ritual slaughterer, who acquired a special knife that would never be used on a kosher animal. After slaughtering it in the “proper” ritual manner, the  shochet  examined the pig’s lungs to look for blemishes. He had no idea what he was looking at, but he finally concluded the lungs had no serious abrasions (and was therefore “smooth” or “ glatt ”). “So, nu?” the man asked, “Rabbi, is this pig kosher?” The rabbi examined the lungs for some time and then declared:...