Wednesday 24 November 2010

How Did Turkey Become Kosher?

I'm taking Turkey's Kashrut as axiomatic and then asking "how did it come about"?

«For some reason ... when the turkey question was posed it often took the form of "why is it eaten?" rather than "may it be eaten?". As has been shown, despite the fundamental difficulty with permitting turkey virtually all of the responsa are permissive...»

See

Is Turkey Kosher?
http://www.kashrut.com/articles/turkey/

And in particular

Is Turkey Kosher?
http://www.kashrut.com/articles/turk_part5/

«A possible explanation as to how the turkey came to be accepted despite the Ramo's position is that it came via Sephardic lands. The Spanish and Turks were the first to bring it to Europe, and Sephardim, who were not constrained by the Ramo, accepted it as kosher. When turkey then made its way to eastern Europe the knowledge that there was a mesorah traveled with it. The origin of this mesorah was jumbled, and hence the references to mesorahs from India and the like. »

This has been my favourite explanation
That having been accepted by S'phardim the Ashkenazim took on THAT M'sorah, also probably in that it has a poultry "look and feel" made such acceptance Palatable [pun intended]

Shalom
RRW

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