Vayechi – Chukkat ha-goy

Written by Rabbi Colin Eimer — 2 January 2024

Growing up in Hendon United Synagogue in the 1950s, it was de rigeur to have one’s head covered in the synagogue. I remember once asking my father why we needed to wear a kippah. He said just two words – ‘koved rosh’ – as if that explained it all. Only a decade later at Leo Baeck College did I read in the Mishnah: “One should only pray in a spirit of koved rosh” (Berachot 5:1) meaning something like ‘seriousness’ or ‘not in a lighthearted spirit.’ Koved’ means ‘heavy.’ So when my father said ‘koved rosh,’ probably just repeating what he’d been told as a kid, he was saying something like “we pray ‘koved rosh’ ‘heavy of head,’” literally ‘with something heavy on it’ like a kippah. But to see ‘koved rosh’ like that was clearly to misunderstand what the Mishnah meant by those words.

As we know, nothing in Jewish law dictates that we must cover our heads in prayer. At various times in the Jewish past men were called to the Torah bareheaded. There are photos of chassidic rebbes without head covering. In later editions of books with those photos, a kippah has been photo-shopped in! (see Marc Shapiro, Changing the immutable: how Orthodox Judaism rewrites its history The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, Oxford, 2015)

Jump 20 or so years to 1977 when my father died. In his will he repeated what he’d always said in life, that he wanted to be buried in Jerusalem, and wanted me to accompany his body for burial there, which I did. Before returning to London I went to a local stonemason to arrange for his tombstone.

We sorted out the details – Hebrew name, dates, what inscription I wanted. Obviously these would all be in Hebrew. But I wanted our family name to be in Latin characters also, so that my mother and siblings could find the grave when visiting. “That’s not allowed,” I was told, “because it was chukkat ha-goy, literally “the law of the non-Jew.” This is a Talmudic concept (Sanhedrin 74a and elsewhere) aimed at ensuring that Jews didn’t imitate the customs and practices of the non-Jews among whom they lived.

Perhaps I should have reminded the stone mason of what we read about Jacob in our sidra this morning: “va’ya’chantu ha’rofim et Yisrael” “the physicians embalmed Israel.” (Genesis 50:2.) Jacob must have been given the full works: mummification and embalming. Interestingly, none of the traditional commentators feel the need to say anything about this non-Jewish practice, except for Rashi who simply explains that “embalming involves using aromatic spices.” “If all that was OK for Jacob,” I wondered, “what harm could there be to put my father’s name in Latin characters?”

On Sabbatical in Jerusalem some years later, I looked into this concept of chukkat ha-goy. [Zimmels “Inyan chukkat ha-goyim bi’she’elot u’teshuvot” in Sefer Yovel Chanoch Albeck (Mossad HaRav Kook, Jerusalem 1963)] On the face of it, it seems straightforward enough. ‘Things that non-Jews do – we don’t. They have flowers at funerals – so we don’t; they kneel in prayer – so we don’t; they pray bareheaded – so we don’t and so on.

Chukkat ha-goy is based on a verse in Leviticus: you shall not copy the practices of the land of Egypt where you dwelt nor of the land of Canaan where I am taking you. (Leviticus 18:3) The fear, as expressed in the rabbinic period, was that this might lead to Jews adopting the pagan and idolatrous practices of the peoples amongst whom they lived.

It’s a question that invariably arises at this time of year. Der Schlemiehl was a Jewish satirical magazine popular in Germany before the First World War. In its January 1904 issue it had a cartoon showing a chanukiyah but with the branches of the chanukiyah gradually morphing into the branches of a Christmas tree – making the point presumably that, then, as now, there were Jews who had Christmas trees.

In the Hoop Lane cemetery behind the synagogue, one section has vertical headstones; the other flat stones. Jews in Ashkenazi lands had vertical ones, because Christians did; the section with flat stones is Sephardi – Sephardim lived in Moslem lands where the practice was to have horizontal tombstones.

This is, of course, a case of reverse chukkat ha-goy: far from avoiding non-Jewish practice, Judaism reflected it.

On more-recent visits to my father’s grave, it was obvious that whatever prohibition had been in force in 1977 had been lifted because many stones had family names in Latin characters.

Cultural cross-fertilisation happened all the time and everywhere. It was no coincidence that United Synagogue clergy well into the 20thC were referred to as ‘ministers’ or ‘reverend’ and even in the 1950s were often still wearing dog-collars. Chukkat ha-goy would suggest distinctive clothing to mark off the boundaries – which is why Chassidim dress as they do. But in an age when Jews were seeking acceptance in general society, I suspect that chukkat ha-goy was considered less-important than saying to the non-Jewish world, “you see, our religious leaders are no different from yours: they dress the same, have similar titles and so on.”

In “The Christian effect on Jewish Life,” (SCM Press, London, 1994) my colleague, Rabbi Michael Hilton, explored this dimension of the far-from-straightforward relationship between Jews and Christians.

Opinion was divided amongst Jewish authorities about the application of chukkat ha-goy. Some said it only refers to religious practices; others only to superstitious practices. The hardliners – then as now – said that anything imported, as it were, from the outside is chukkat ha-goy.

To come back to that Christmas tree. It’s not a religious symbol, as such, so is chukkat ha-goy relevant here? Many Jewish families have turkey and trimmings at Christmas (without the pigs in blankets I assume…..) So why not a Christmas tree? One of the often-heard arguments against Reform is that once you start making changes, you’re on a slippery slope that will take you out of Judaism. That cartoon in Der Schlemiehl suggests just that. It’s what I call the ‘diluting the orange squash’ argument. If you keep adding water to the concentrate you’ll eventually lose all taste of it as orange. But nobody making orange squash just keeps adding water in that way, just as nobody making changes in Jewish life would continue doing so until it’s no longer recognisable as Judaism.

Flowers at Jewish funerals are barely mentioned in rabbinic literature before the 18thC. The question only arose as Jews were more involved with the non-Jewish world. While flowers at Jewish funerals in this country are still pretty uncommon, there’s not the widespread sense of chukkat ha-goy that there was, say, a generation ago when I started in the rabbinate. But go to any cemetery in Israel and you’ll see flower sellers outside.

I remember hearing Louis Jacobs addressing the issue of chukkat ha-goy. As smoking became more commonplace, Jews wanted to know if they could smoke in synagogue buildings – I presume not during services…. Jacobs said no halachic authorities forbade it on halachic grounds. But many said that Christians don’t smoke in their churches because they believe it detracts from the sanctity of the place. Heaven forbid, they said, that Jews should smoke in synagogue and lead Christians to think that Jews respect their place of worship any less. Therefore don’t smoke in synagogue!

What becomes clear is how Judaism and Christianity have influenced each other in obvious and more subtle ways. Each defined its practice and theology so as to differentiate itself from the other, to mark off boundaries. But in so doing, you are implicitly acknowledging that the other does, indeed, influence you to a greater or lesser extent. Otherwise why be so aware of, so concerned about, boundary issues?

As Michael Hilton puts it, “the two faiths could never converge, because then the distinctive features of each would be lost; but neither could they diverge too far, because then debate and comparison would cease to be possible.” (Hilton p243) This might account, he suggests, for the so-called ‘dual image’ of the Jew: sometimes seen as ‘good guy,’ sometimes ‘bad guy.’ And that, in turn is a sort of mirror image of how Jews have seen the non-Jewish world: as both persecutor and yet, at the same time, ‘some of my best friends are non-Jews.’

Of course we don’t want to lose the distinctive character of Judaism but it’s not by being resistant to the wisdom that lies in other religious traditions. For it is in dialogue that our ideas are sharpened and honed. In true dialogue we are obliged, by the very nature of the exercise itself, to define ourselves because only then can we define ourselves to the other. And that can never be a fruitless exercise.