Hashkafically Speaking
What exactly is the responsibility of a kashrus agency? Is its role limited to ensuring that the food is kosher, or does it extend to the broader hashkafa, ethics, and conduct of the establishments it certifies? In this first part of a fascinating two-part discussion, Rabbi Sholem Fishbane, executive director of the cRc and AKO, joins R' Yitzchok Hisiger to explore the many considerations that go into this question, from lifnei iver and tznius to geneivas daas and dina d'malchusa dina. Through real-life examples and fascinating halachic perspectives, Rabbi Fishbane sheds light on the broader responsibilities that come with overseeing kashrus.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: Hello, everyone, and welcome back to Let's Talk Kashrus, presented by the Kashrus Awareness Project and the cRc of Chicago. Today, I am privileged to be joined by Rabbi Sholem Fishbane, kashrus administrator of the cRc of Chicago. Thank you, Rabbi Fishbane, as well for being here again. And I should mention that you're the executive director of AKO, which is part of what led to this conversation, which is an interesting question, not your typical one when it comes to kashrus, because we're we're usually talking about the X's and O's of kashrus, usually halachic-oriented.
But something that has come up time and again is the role of a kashrus agency when it comes to the hashkafa of an event or an establishment. And how a kashrus organization, and especially AKO, which oversees and brings together so many different kashrus organizations, how you deal with it? And I know it's a it's a real loaded topic with many different facets. I don't know if we'll be able to get through all of it today, but let's let's start the conversation. What what is the role of a kashrus agency when it comes to the hashkafa of kashrus?
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: So, that's every single day where we are we have to deal with that question, because let me start from the beginning.
There is no way a person could adopt the the stance that it's just the food, give a hechsher to the food, and don't look at anything else. I mean, everybody has a red line, everybody, depending on what neighborhood you are and whatnot. You know, if if if there would be a fundraiser by, you know, just to use an extreme example of a a neo-Nazi fundraiser that want to be kosher, I mean even the the people that say, "Just the food," they'll they'll say, "Of course, no, no, not that," right? And if you want to push back, I'll find you a worse case, right? So, look, everybody has a red line, and depending where you come from. I remember one time we had in our office, a a group of doctors came in, and they felt that you're a kashrus agency, which includes kol haTorah kulah.
There's a mitzvah in the Torah, v'nishmartem me'od es nafshoseichem, and one of the things we notice is all this loaded trans fats in the cRc kosher bakeries. It's a it's against halacha and therefore stop giving, you know, right? That that's just like one day another aspect from that, right? What what would you say if you were a kashrus agency, right? So so, but that's a great question. Like is it There's a hashkafa, you mentioned the word hashkafa, but many times it falls into actual halacha. Lifnei iveir, right? You walk into a kosher restaurant and there's non-Jewish music being played, or there's non-tznius.
What exactly is the thing? And in some neighborhoods, they won't give a hechsher if there's Wi-Fi being offered. You know that? Depending on where you come from. These are These are fascinating conversations and halacha, and every agency needs to look at the general approach of what they're going to do, because, you know, Rav Pam once said to someone in kashrus, he said that, "Many times when you're faced with this, you have to see, what would be if you would not give the hechsher, will they eat non-kosher?" Right? There's there's a there's a very basic approach for that. So, that's kind of almost the hakdamah to this to this very fascinating conversation.
And throughout the years, I've really come up with, you know, different categories almost. Like you said, there's the lifnei iveir side, there's the tznius, the non-Jewish music, the the we we were giving a hechsher to a ice cream, an ice cream store, and it was in a a very frum neighborhood, and the locals that lived around there were pressuring us tremendously not to give the hechsher unless we put shrubs around the outside eating area because of first, ochel bashuk domeh l'kelev, but more that they didn't want to see that what was going on, you know. And they felt that was our purview. And the rabbonim, the kashrus agencies, we always get the call whether something's going I'll give you a great example, and this is kind of another part is geneivas daas.
So, I have a mechutan who called me that he went out to eat, and, you know, he saw he finished eating, and then he tipped very nicely on the bottom. And when he got home, he noticed the gratuity was already included.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: Oh, wow.
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: But on the bottom it said "total tip." Now, he didn't read the fine print or, you know, actually see the gratuity, and he called, he says, "You know, what do the kashrus agencies"-this is very much your question.
Yeah. "What does the kashrus agency stand on that, and is it your responsibility?" He was just like shmoozing with me about it. What What do you think? Is it our responsibility? If If you walk in, and now you see you you double-tipped, who would you call, by the way?
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: Yeah, I don't even know. Call the rav hamachshir, right?
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: So let me just tell you what I did with the tip. So I actually called around, and I spoke to various poskim at the time, but I think what Reb Shlomo Miller told me was something that really stuck.
He says it is your responsibility from a halacha standpoint. There's a mitzvah of hashavas aveidah. So you, the kashrus, and you know that this fellow is adding the word tip, and people don't read, so you know that this guy lost his money, you have a chiyuv. So I'll tell you what we did.
We required all of our places to add the word "additional tip" on all of the sheets. So that's that's one way that that we dealt with it in terms of that. Now, another very unrelated to We'll call it the mamonus side of things, which again we get is dina d'malchusa dina. Huge conversation.
What do I mean by that? A home business. We get called all the time, "Will you give a hechsher to a home business?" We almost always say no, for the reason of dina d'malchusa dina. What does that mean? Do you know it's against the law to sell food that you make in a place that doesn't have a health code? That's the law. Now, if you learn the sugyas of dina d'malchusa, which most poskim say is d'Oraisa, it's it's a fascinating sugya.
I'm not here to tell you everybody should do what they they need to do. I could just tell you that we went through the sugya, and besides practically if someone gets sick by food that we certify that was made illegally, we're putting ourselves at risk at risk from, you know, legal, but also from this halacha of dina d'malchusa. Now, in the sugyas of dina d'malchusa, the poskim say, and this is what this is the, you know, really how we look at it, there's there's two types of dina d'malchusas. There's dina d'malchusa like taxes and and more mamonus type of thing, which the poskim deal with, and then there's the dina d'malchusa that the government makes rules to protect its citizens.
And that the poskim say you have to take very, very seriously. Not to say the other one not, we're not talking about the mamonus, but laws by by the government that are made to protect its citizen for health and other reasons, that is a very serious halacha, and therefore we won't give a hashgacha on a place that's illegal, which is a she'eilah of dina d'malchusa, aside for the other thing I mentioned. Now, the truth is, just practically speaking, there's something called cottage laws. Cottage laws, especially since COVID, where a lot of people started doing home businesses, they the government allows certain things.
So, we look at it. Does the cottage law allow Every state is different, you should check it up, every state differently, but the government does allow you to sell certain things, let's say you're melting a chocolate, whatever, you know, whatever like. I just had last week someone came to my office, he wants to start cleaning He's an expert in tola'im. So he wants to start cleaning, you know, buying whole lettuce and cleaning it and then selling bagged for Shabbos.
Great great business, right? So, hold on. I went on to the Illinois We're based in Illinois, and it actually says vegetables Green vegetables are forbidden by cottage laws. I mean, they're allowing a lot of other stuff, but not that. Listeria and all that, you know, all the other E. coli, things that that come up in in green vegetables. So I said, "I'm sorry, I can't."
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: Wow.
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Yeah, so and this is part of your question. I know, again, there's so much to talk about, but these are the things that actually come up every single day.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: So So the bottom line is you're telling me from what I'm hearing from the few examples that we've gone through so far that you really do take that seriously, meaning the I'm calling it the hashkafa of kashrus, we could call it the ethics, right, the ethics and morals of hashkafa.
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Right.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: You, as the rav hamachshir, do really take that into account.
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Right.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: Especially it sounds like dina d'malchusa for sure,
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Right.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: but other examples as well.
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Yeah, there's so many examples when it comes to you know, just the food. There's animal welfare, is that our responsibility? Pesach hotels people go, there's all sorts of things going on there.
Does the hechsher have to worry about the the elevator, the the pool, you know, there's stuff like that? Can you can you give a hechsher to a restaurant that doesn't have a sukkah?
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: Right. Or they're open during the Nine Days, you know, and and it's and most people you know, these are the types of things that that come into to play. Today there's also, would you give a hashgacha on vapes? Would you give a hashgacha on marijuana? Would you give a hashgacha, you know, some places say don't give a hashgacha where one of the local rabbonim machshirim told me, local meaning here here in in New Jersey, that he got on an application for a lady that wanted to sell cakes. Minimum cake was .
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: And he felt, not for our community, no way.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: Really?
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Yeah.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: That's interesting.
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Yeah.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: Cuz that's even more of an that's not a health issue. That's not a dina d'malchusa dina issue. I don't know what we would call it. We would call it excess- excessiveness.
Excessiveness, gashmius.
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Gashmius. Again, most communities like, "What? That's what you're thinking about, gashmius? We just want to make sure everybody keeps kosher."
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: Right.
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: And you know, and and and there are many cases like this, you know.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: But then it really becomes so arbitrary, because like like you were just alluding to, to one person what's excessive, to another person may be standard. And and, you know, so do you make up the rules as you go along? Like how how does
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: No, so it's a it's a good question. And what we look at is if somebody's walking into a CRC establishment, we want them to keep kol haTorah kulah, which means that there's nothing in that that they're going to be over, okay? As opposed to because that they came in, so therefore the the the tznius, the music, we actually go through the the music list in our restaurants to make sure that there's no woman singing, and that even if it's not a woman, but it's provocative, we don't allow. You know, we we literally, our Av Beis Din have sat down with some of the owners that have pushed back, and gone through the That That's what it go- comes out of.
So if you walk in, you're a ben Torah, and you want to keep obviously you keep kol you keep Torah, you don't want to be walk into a place that has a hashgacha that that will
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: Listen, the truth is we're we're out of time for this episode,
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Right.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: but I I see this as a massive topic. I want to pick this up,
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Yes.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: if it's okay with you. The next time we meet,
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Absolutely. Yes.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: we'll continue this conversation.
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Right.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: I didn't realize what we got ourselves into. This is a really huge topic.
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Huge, huge.
R' Yitzchok Hisiger: And and from the questions that we've gotten, it's really one of the most pressing kashrus issues today, as much as it's not, like we said, in the Xs and Os of kashrus, but it really is.
And it comes down to, like you said, understanding the kashrus consumer, and serving them in that capacity. So b'ezras Hashem, next time we talk, we'll continue with some more examples of what we called hashkafa in the world of kashrus. Thank you so much.
Rabbi Sholem Fishbane: Looking forward.
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