Chulin

Embark on a journey of Jewish learning and discovery, exploring the depth of our Chulin resources, where tagged items including audio, programs, and podcast episodes await your exploration.

Chulin 9: Practical Rabbinics

Rabbi Jay Kelman

There are few, if any, semicha programs that require their students to learn shechita or safrut, and even fewer that require good penmanship. None would accept a student who did not know how to write. But the requirements of rabbis in…
Article
Dec 24, 2018

Chulin7: Pass the Pork

Rabbi Jay Kelman

One of the questions I am often asked by those of my students who do not keep kosher, is have you really never eaten non-kosher food? I generally reply along the lines that I have never knowingly eaten non-kosher food, have never eaten at McDonalds…
Article
Dec 20, 2018

Chulin 7: The Idolatrous Snake

Rabbi Jay Kelman

Over and over again the Torah warns us not to allow avodah zara, idolatry, in the Land of Israel. Yet, as is often the case, things are not always quite so simple and at times there can be other considerations that outweigh a seemingly clear Torah…
Article
Dec 18, 2018

Chulin 7: Time for Something New

Rabbi Jay Kelman

"It was for this reason that man was first created as one person [Adam]…to teach that no man is the same as another; therefore, every person must say, ‘For my sake ‎the world was created’” (Sanhedrin 37a). The…
Article
Dec 13, 2018

Chulin 5: The Stroke of a Pen

Rabbi Jay Kelman

In the fall of 1860, Rav Yaakov Ettlinger penned what is likely the most revolutionary responsa of modern times; one that opened the door to allowing, for the first time in Jewish history, those who publicly desecrated the Shabbat to remain part of…
Article
Dec 11, 2018

Chulin 4: The Idolatrous Shochet

Rabbi Jay Kelman

Some years back I attended a talk by Rabbi Dr. M.D. Tendler who spoke about the most important teshuvot written by his father-in-law, Rav Moshe Feinstein zt”l. Amongst the most important teshuvot[1] he discussed, was his allowance of…
Article
Dec 10, 2018

Chulin 3: Meet the Shochet

Rabbi Jay Kelman

That the role of a modern rabbi in the Western World is far different than that of the rabbi of Eastern Europe is rather obvious. The typical 19th century Polish rabbi, for example, did little pastoral work, did not deliver sermons, raise money…
Article
Dec 5, 2018

An Introduction and Overview of Masechet Chulin

Rabbi Jay Kelman

Masechet Chulin, a derivative of the word chol, translates as “The Secular Tractate”, and stands in contrast to the first two masechtot of seder Kodshim, those of Zevachim and Menachot, which deal with the laws of animal and grain…
Article
Dec 3, 2018