Kosher Watermelon

Note: Not to be taken halacha leMaaseh.

So I recently joined Areivim, to see what sort of stuff is being discussed there. One recent popular topic is watermelons, and the post and the reactions illustrates an important point.

One poster noticed in his local (non-Jewish) supermarket that there were sliced watermelons with tape on them indicating that they were under the hashgocha of a certain Rav. Not realizing that there may indeed be halachic problems with buying sliced watermelon from a non-Jewish source (more on that later), he posted this, asking what this was about.

Some posters in fact would never buy a sliced watermelon, so they assumed that if he was questioning the need for it, the situation must have been whole, unsliced watermelon. (The original poster did not clarify.) They then proceeded to mock this new chumra of requiring a hashgocha on whole, unsliced watermelons.

Some understood the true context, that of sliced watermelon, and explained how upon talking to a mashgiach, certain things came out. Namely, that in a big-name supermarket, they comply with American law which requires that cutting produce and cutting meat products be done in separate areas of the store, and using different knives. One other poster noted that he witnessed in smaller, mom-and-pop stores, he witnessed workers using the same knife.

Other posters never heard of this issue with sliced watermelons, considered it a new chumra, and mocked it for that. They have some knowledge of the operating principles of halacha and felt themselves capable of deciding halacha on that basis, concluding that this new chumra is ridiculous. One poster stated that the knife is cold and dry, so should not be a problem, the melon is 60 times whatever pork grease is on the knife, and even the knife itself, sufficient to nullify it, and the worker is not Jewish and has no intent of nullifying it, such that it is no issue of ain mevatlin issur lechatchila.

And the posts go on from there, under the assumption that this is an unnecessary hechsher for anyone to want, on to the more general topic kashrut agencies providing hashgocha where none is needed (this now, for many, being an addition example of this).

What is problematic with the reasoning above, about the knife being cold and dry, and bittul bishishim?

Well, in terms of the knife, there is an additional principle about which the poster was unaware, that of duchka desakina, the pressure of the knife. {Update: But see comments below, why duchka desakina may or may not be applicable here.} This is found on Chullin daf 8, in which the knife of a non-Jew was used to perform kosher slaughter on an animal. But the knife had previously been used to slaughter a non-kosher animal. There is a dispute whether one needs to merely wash the surface of the cut, or whether one needs to take away a klipah, that is, to trim the surface, because the pressure of the knife causes absorption a slight amount into the meat. Thus, the fact that it is a knife being used to cut takes away from the fact that it is cold and dry, and in fact absorption is an issue, because of the pressure of the knife. But the poster never heard of this principle.

Furthermore, since it is only on the surface of the cut, or only absorbed a tiny bit into the surface rather than being distributed throughout the entire volume of the watermelon, we do not have the 60 X required to nullify it. And since nullification does not happen, the intent of the worker does not figure into it.

There are indeed other factors that might obviate the need for such a hechsher - namely, the chazaka that they would not use the specialized knife for other purposes, and the American law that requires the same -- though there might be some issue in one of those mom-and-pop stores. (By the way, my own family's practice is not to buy cut watermelon except from a Jewish supermarket or fruit store. So this is not some newfangled custom.)

Whether or not this eventually gets resolved on the mailing list, this is illustrative of a bunch of recent issues. Yes, copepods and Indian hair wigs, widely mocked as excessive chumra-ness.

However, by those issues as well, most people commenting had no idea of the halachic principles at play. Because hilchot tolaim and hilchot tikrovet Avodah Zarah do not often come up, and they don't know what principles apply. Perhaps some chareidim, in preemptively burning the wigs, did so also out of lack of knowledge of how to apply the principles. But some people tried to apply the principles they did know, thinking that their high-school Jewish education supplied them with all the necessary principles to apply, even to arcane issues of Jewish law -- making them at least on par to evaluate any issue as rabbis who had studied the issues in depth, or were capable of quickly getting up to speed.

Further, many evaluated the situations based on misperceptions or assumptions that just were not so. Such as the many people who assumed that copepods were bacteria, and that these chumra-crazies did not have a fifth-grade education such that now they were waking up to the fact that there are bacteria in food and water. Note that the answer to copepods and Indian hair sheitels, and watermelon, may in fact be that it is muttar, but there is actually what to discuss before coming to that conclusion.