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• The Bukharian Jews who use the yeshiva building on 108th and 66th Road (one block from the YM/WHA) on high holy days also practice Kaparot and have been for years.

  I remember the first year they came in and parked a flatbed truck filled with chickens in front of the school — the neighborhood was in complete stun! And the sounds from the chickens? It was pretty freaky.

  Steve, I hope you are prepared for several comments on how you are insensitive, making fun of someone’s religion and religious practices, etc.

  Posted by MaryJane
  on September 24th, 2007 at 9:02 am

• More evolved people use money instead and that is donated to the poor. This barbaric practice flies in the face of the teaching that go against using sacrifice as a manner of replacement of one’s good acts. There is little support for this in the general community and it should be stopped all told. Sometimes, traditions are just bad and need to be stopped. This is not making fun of anyone, it is cruel and causes unnecessary pain to the animal, which by the way, goes against the jewish law as well.

  If indeed these people believe that we have sole dominion over the creatures of the earth, we should be their protectors, not their torturers.

  Posted by KGResident
  on September 24th, 2007 at 9:10 am

• Things like this make me worry about the mindsets of otherwise rational-seeming people. Although I can’t limit it to one particular religious custom. Catholicism, Judaism, Islam all have customs are downright odd. I don’t agree with Bill Maher on a lot of things, but when it comes to religion and its effect on society, I think he is on point.

  Posted by Peter
  on September 24th, 2007 at 9:23 am

• I am indeed prepared for that, MaryJane, but I fully plan on using my three years in an honest-to-Hashem yeshiva day school featuring four hours a day of religious instruction by long-bearded, black-hatted rabbis as a defense.

  Posted by Steve
  on September 24th, 2007 at 9:28 am

• Happy New Year to all those who observe. If you will pardon me, I have to clean up the mess from a chicken projectile that flew through my window.

  Posted by bobbyrab
  on September 24th, 2007 at 10:14 am

• My Parents are Jewish and my Dad is even a holocaust survivor. They never ever taught me that. And my Dad goes to pray every year on the high holiday. However, my Mom was in an orphan school (yes, I probably need therapy) ran by Hasidics (sp) and they tortured her. This sounds like one of their overblown old school ways.
  Like women sitting separate during prayer cuz they might be dirty with their periods.

  Posted by Jayne
  on September 24th, 2007 at 12:45 pm

• “I feel like Chicken Tonight, like Chicken Tonight…”

  Posted by Birds of a Feather
  on September 24th, 2007 at 8:30 pm

• After you “swing” your chicken, will they clean and cut it up for you? Those kosher chickens are the best . . .

  Posted by Sarah
  on September 24th, 2007 at 10:08 pm

• I believe they’re donated to the poor or something. You might be able to work out a deal.

  Posted by Steve
  on September 25th, 2007 at 12:50 am

• If they also do some chicken juggling, I’m so there…

  Posted by peterd
  on September 25th, 2007 at 11:11 am

• Sorry to revive this thread, but everyone here is obviously not particularly knowledgeable about Torah Judiasm (sorry Steve). The custom of using a chicken goes way back, and is still practiced by most Chassidim. Which brings to mind, Jayne, that you and your mother also are very wrong about why women and men sit separately in the synagogue. It has nothing to do with a woman’s menstrual cycle - it’s because men shouldn’t be distracted from their prayers. Since men are more easily distracted then women, we have to make certain accomodations for their weaknesses.

  Posted by FHNative
  on December 28th, 2007 at 12:26 pm

• Well, respectfully, FHNative, I’m going to have to beg to differ. I’m well aware that the chicken thing is an old practice, but I do have to take issue with your conflation of kaparot with “Torah Judaism”–which I understand is a popular term among Orthodox Jews but which is also a bit of a confrontational term, you have to admit, implying that Conservative, Reform and other Jews have lost touch with Torah, an assertion most of them would likely dispute. You described it as a “custom,” which is entirely accurate–it’s not at all halachic, as evidenced by Yosef Karo’s distaste for it. While it is true that it remains popular among Hasidim, Hasidism itself is a relatively new form of Jewish practice that started as a rebellious movement less than 300 years ago and has its own traditions, which it very well may believe to be closely connected to the spirit of Torah but much of which originated with the Ba’al Shem Tov and his inheritors, rather than being the pure form of Judaism that many, both Jews and non-Jews, mistakenly believe it to be.

  Posted by Steve
  on December 28th, 2007 at 12:48 pm

• u guys are all ignorant on this subject, and have many mistakes in your arguments.please read and understand the subject which you think you know well before you even attempt to criticize it. the jews are the only religion in the world that doesnt torture animals, we kill them for food , and yes all those kaparot go to poor families which desperately need them. when we kill the animal , we take extreme measures to make sure it does not suffer in the process, tell me one other religion that does this.

  Posted by joe
  on February 26th, 2009 at 6:30 pm

• Swingin’ Chickens

  i know this is an old thread, but just wanted to point out that the chickens aren’t actually swung above your head like a rubber chicken in a vaudeville act. At least that’s not how I’ve seen it done. The chicken is held above the head in both hands, which has its own drawbacks, but the bird is handled gently. Personally, I do kapparot with money that I then give to charity.

  Posted by Judy
  on April 26th, 2009 at 6:27 pm

• You can talk all about chicken swinging that you want. Check out how the chickens are kept and treated in factory farms. How the chickens are kept in cramped quarters about the size of an 8 by 11 size paper and how their beaks are cut off without anesthesia so they don’t peck each other to death, how the male chicks which have no use to the greedy factory “farmers” put them live in grinders to be ground up and disposed of. All animals that are killed for food suffer torturous pain and anguish as they know their end is coming.

  Best not to purchase, swing or eat a chicken.

  Posted by Rabbitfriend
  on May 2nd, 2009 at 9:11 pm

• The utter nonesense of these replies defending this barbaric and idiotic practice! Kaparot has NOTHING to do with Torah Judiasm. There is NOTHING in the Torah about it. Secondly it is barbaric. You are having UNTRAINED people (children in some cases!) killing these animals. This is horrible, torturous to the animal and it has nothing to do with one’s religion. I am a Jew and I find this practice abhorrent and contrary to my beliefs. Third it is being performed AT NIGHT in a RESIDENTIAL neighborhood IN A PARKING LOT with NO CONCERN to the residents of this neighborhood. This practice must cease immediately. The elected officials of this neighborhood should be UP IN ARMS over this and working furiously to ensure that this not occur again this year!!!

  Posted by Bill
  on May 14th, 2009 at 4:51 pm

• Stop…those chickens are my relatives….please stop it!!

  Posted by Chicken Little
  on May 17th, 2009 at 2:22 am

• I am a desendant of Georgian Jews…and was interested in finding out more of the history of my family…but really now, this is disturbing on so mayny levels and now I’m not so sure I want to learn more. Of course, it’s highly probable that my ancestry is from a different sect, like maybe the Ashkenazic Jews or some other sect. Using animals in this manner to assuage ones sins is pathetic. If you feels that bad about your humanity…seek pennace in solitude and quiet reflection on the nature of your soul and the grace of God.

  Posted by Jack Freeman
  on May 17th, 2009 at 2:30 am

• As a secular Jew, I fast in Yom Kippur.

  I live down the block from this Temple. I was repulsed by this ceremony.

  I called 311 and ASPCA, all said that the congregation were in their right under “religious” observations. Second, as long as the chickens are cooped “Humanely” they are within their rights. The smell, the sight, the condition…ain’t nothing Humanely about it!

  Now, moving on to the fact that after the chickens are killed they are then donated to charity.

  Hummm, isn’t that nice, ones sins go forth to an animal only to be ingested by a “poor” person. If say, this ritual works…why on earth would you want someone else to be ingesting your sins. Sounds like the world will always have sinners don’t it!

  This is wrong on so many levels, spiritually, physically and emotionally.

  Posted by Lulu Bee
  on September 25th, 2009 at 10:23 am

• It is a horrible and disgusting custom and should not happen in a residential neighborhood. But the politicians & police don’t give a crap, so nothing will be done.

  Posted by foodie
  on September 27th, 2009 at 9:55 pm

• There needs to be a law against this type of thing in a residential neighborhood. Let them go to the slaughter house and perform their religious ceremony. These folks are being extremely inconsiderate of their neighbors and are hiding behind the banner of religious freedom in conducting this fowl practice.

  Posted by nanook
  on October 2nd, 2009 at 8:28 am

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