The Jewish Survivalist Contemplating Kosher After Doomsday
Image by iStock
Michael is a modern Orthodox Jew with three kids, a mortgage he’s paying off, and one big storage closet in his house filled with piles of water bottles and baked beans. He thinks disaster might strike soon, wiping out most of the human race and modern civilization and leaving the remainder of humanity to fend for themselves. He’s a survivalist — and he wants to keep kosher when the world as he knows it ends. He’s one of a very small group of Jews that are stocking up for Doomsday.
These survivalists, or “preppers” as they call themselves, prepare for the worst by stocking up on non-perishable items, by learning how to hunt and by making everything from pepper spray to bomb shelters themselves.
For an observant Jewish prepper, matters are even more complicated. They must find shelf-stable food that hew to kosher specifications. The blog JewishPreppers makes list of kosher foods with long shelf lives and it’s run by Josh Wander, a former IDF soldier and self-described middle class Jew. On the Survival Podcast’s forums, a discussion of permissible dehydrated foods ensued. In dark corners of the Internet, the rare discussions about kosher rations are being had by Jewish preppers.
Michael is looking into purchasing a tilapia tank and raising his own chickens which he will one day eat, after studying the correct method for kosher slaughter. The art of meat preserving and home canning are hobbies he’s planning to pick up, too.
Most lifeboat rations, as the pre-packaged, non-perishable food items are known, contain animal products and certainly do not have kosher certification. Humanitarian Daily Rations, or HDRs, are food rations intended for humanitarian crises and they contain no animal byproducts — but they shouldn’t be eaten for longer than two weeks, and they’re expensive, to boot.
Besides, Michael probably won’t be keeping strictly kosher when the apocalypse comes.
“According to the Torah you are allowed to break rules to save human lives,” Michael told me. “In a disaster-type situation, worst case scenario, I can eat a rabbit. They’re not kosher but it’s an emergency.”
Will Michael make a bracha, or blessing, on his non-kosher rabbits before he eats them?
“Of course,” he said.
Shira Feder is a writer for the Forward. Write her at [email protected]
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
