Vegan Meal: Rabbinical School

Vagary Dept: My pots, pans and cutting boards being infected with treif non-kosher food , Rabbi Aaron Levy can t eat in my home. So he invites me to his. No prep, not even dicing onions, can be done in advance. For an additional challenge, we ve scheduled Saturday dinner. Since there is no work allowed on the Sabbath, we can t start cooking until the sun goes down, according to The Star. Well, what s work? asks Levy, in a rhetorical tone they must teach in rabbinical school. All the Torah says, he tells me, is don t do any manner of work. It s only in later rabbinic interpretation that it susses out, What does it mean, don t do any work? And then, based on biblical interpretation, creates 39 categories of work, that then get further subdivided . . . This is my favourite part of Judaism; the lawyering of every last biblical vagary and if you re a proponent of meat, it s a good challenge to cook an occasional vegan meal. It s a better challenge to cook a kosher vegan meal. Sheesh. Imagine the kookiness of considering cooking to be work. As reported in the news.
@t aaron levy, rabbi aaron