[Avodah] Kashrus Question

[Daniel Israel]

On Tue, 27 Nov 2007 12:59:47 -0700 "Prof. Levine" 
<llevine at stevens.edu> wrote:
>One person who is involved in the supervision of a donut store 
told 
>me that they actually visit the store on Pesach. If they did not, 
>then they would have to kasher the place after Pesach, he wrote.
>
>So I have to ask (again), "These donuts that are manufactured on 
>Pesach under supervision are kosher for whom? What does this 
>supervision on Pesach mean?" I presume that the sign saying the 
>store is under supervision is not removed on Pesach.

I am very confused by your continuing to ask this question.  It 
seems to me you have answered it yourself.  So perhaps you need to 
restate the question to clarify what is actually bothering you.

The basic problem here seems to be the word, "kosher."  
M'd'oraissa, there is no such thing as "kosher."  There is basar 
v'chalav, n'veilah, terumah, chometz, etc., all of which make it 
assur to eat something.  Each are separate dinim.  Furthermore, 
something is not kosher for someone; it is simply a violation of 
one or more issurim to eat, or not.

The donuts are chometz, which is prohibited for Jews on Pesach, but 
which violate none of the other issurim regarding food (and are 
therefore permissible to eat not on Pesach).  If by "kosher for 
whom?" you mean to ask "who is allowed to eat them because of the 
certification, the answer is clearly, nobody.  But if you mean 
supervised for what purpose, the answer is in order that the donut 
shop doesn't need to be rekashered after Pesach.

My chometz dishes are also kosher all Pesach, even though I can't 
cook with them.  I seal them up, rather than leaving them with a 
non-Jewish neighbor because in that case I would keep having to 
make surprise inspections to make sure my neighbor didn't cook with 
them.  Ditto with the donut shop.

Assuming the shop is owned by a non-Jew, there is no reason to 
require him to close, and there is every reason to continue 
certifying.  If there was some real danger of Jews thinking that 
the donuts were mutar on Pesach, maybe we would at least remove the 
sign, or put up one saying that they are not, but I don't think 
this is a real chashash.

--
Daniel M. Israel
dmi1 at cornell.edu