KOSHER WATER

Not too long ago, a yokel purchased a piece of property not far from where I live. But this was a most fortunate man. Under his barren land lay the largest pure water spring in the state. He had become a rich man nearly overnight. He bottled the water for consumers and food producers, and it was so pure that with proper sterilization it was sold all over the country to hospitals and research institutions.

One day the yokel sought me out. He was frantic. His salesman has tried to sell water to a company that produced kosher soups. He was told that his water would not be acceptable unless it was under rabbinical supervision.

The poor yokel could not appreciate the absurdity of the question, because he had not the slightest idea about kashrut. Assuming that he was a Bible-believing Christian, I referred him to the relevant passages in Leviticus and Deuteronomy, which he knew by heart. “But it doesn’t say anything about water!” he observed.

What could I tell him? That some rabbinical organization was trying to extort money from the suppliers of the water that went into the soup? So, standing in this facility that was producing absolutely sterile water for nuclear reactors, I made up some doubletalk about how they needed assurance that the water was “really pure.”

“Well, Rabbi,” he asked the obvious question, “can’t you tell them that it’s really pure?”

Another dilemma. I tried to explain to the befuddled yokel that he needed one of those rabbis with the beards and black hats and long black coats. He finally understood when I explained that I was like an Episcopalian and they were like Baptists.

I lost touch with the yokel, but I assume that his water is now kosher to orthodox standards, before it becomes polluted by the chicken and noodles.

The whole episode reminds me of the day in school that we looked at a drop of water through a microscope. We saw all kinds of one-cell creatures swimming around, and as I remember, none of them had fins and scales. Understandably, from that day forward, my beverage of choice has been Warsteiner.