Chabad’s Kaparot Chickens Help the Needy

One of the customs of erev Yom Kippur, the day before the fast, is the mystical Kaparot ceremony, carried out by prescribing a circular motion three times above a person’s head while saying a prayer that symbolically “exchanges” the object above his head for him.

Symbolically, the switch absolves a person of transgressions and the punishment for them, by transferring them to another object which takes his place.

Traditionally, a chicken was held while doing the motion, and it was then ritually slaughtered, cooked and eaten. If the family could afford it, it was given to the poor as a good deed . Alternately, people would hold coins that add up to multiples of the number eighteen, whose letters spell out the world for life in Hebrew, and then give the money to charity.

“This is in exchange for me, this is my substitute, this will go to charity [or be slaughtered] and I will be granted a good and peaceful life,” says the penitent while tracing the circles.

In recent years, animal rights groups have complained that holding the chicken above a person’s head is cruel, a charge dismissed by the Orthodox Jews, mostly Hasidim, who adhere to using a chicken when performing the custom as ridiculous, since the chickens are in no pain. If these groups feel that slaughtering chicken is inhumane, they countered, that has nothing to do with the ceremony and is a different issue entirely.

Collel Chabad in Jerusalem has come up with an organized method to make sure the chickens are used for a good deed: The chickens used in the Kaparot ceremony will be sent to a local soup kitchen after their slaughter, an act that will allow needy people to have a much-needed and appreciated meal.

“The chickens used by people here for Kaparot will go to needy people, most of whom are Holocaust survivors who receive meals from us every day,” said Mendy Bloy, Chairman of Colel Chabad in Jerusalem.

“I think this is the best thing that people can do right before Yom Kippur to make sure that needy people and Holocaust survivors have food for the holidays,” he added.