Judge to decide fate of Kaporos Ritual in NYC

Tommorrow,  Debra James, a Manhattan Supreme Court justice said she’ll rule on weather or not yidden can practice the minhag of kapporos with a chicken. A group calling themselves the”Alliance to End Chickens as Kaporos  of filed a law suit aginst the minhag. They demanded that a Manhattan judge issue a cease and desist order against what they perceive as the “unsanitary” Jewish ritual of slaughtering chickens in the public domain prior to the holiday of Yom Kippur.  The annual ritual involves swinging a live chicken above one’s head to absolve sins from the past year and then having a kosher slaughterer kill the bird and give it to charity to help feed the poor. The group of plaintiffs calling themselves the”Alliance to End Chickens as Kaporos” are from the Borough Park and Crown Heights sections of Brooklyn where the practice is widespread. They claim that the shlugging of kaporos results in a public health hazard with “stench, litter, blood, feces and feathers” polluting the streets. David Jaroslawicz, the attorney representing Orthodox Jews who observe the ritual scrupulously said the protest group has their own agenda and called then a cadre of ‘vegetarians” and vegans” who were stoking the proverbial fires by manufacturing “hysteria” where it does not exist. He took note of the fact that not one single person has ever experiences health related problems from the slaughtered chickens.