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From: R. Kovacs
Subject: Semantic equivalence
Date: 8 Nisan 5782
Nu, this reminds me.
In Munkács there were two kosher butchers, Reb Mendel and Reb Yitzchak. Both supervised by the community rabbi, the same rabbi, with the same hechsher on the door. Both sold beef shechted according to halacha. No question about the kashrus. No question at all.
But my bubbe would only buy from Reb Mendel. She would walk past Yitzchak's shop, cross the street actually, and go to Mendel's even if the line was longer.
I asked her once (I was young, maybe ten, my mother had sent me with her to carry the packages) what was the difference. She thought for a long time, so long I thought she had forgotten the question.
Finally she said: "Mendel salts the meat the way my mother salted it. Yitzchak salts it differently."
I said: "But the rabbi says both are kosher."
She said: "The rabbi says both are permitted. He does not say they are the same."
Both kosher. Both supervised. Both valid. But to my grandmother, they were not equivalent. The difference was not in the law. It was in something else, something the law does not name.
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