Doctor knows if items pass Torah law on mixing of wool and linen
STEFANIE L. PEARSON
Special to Jewish News
Imagine if no one knew how to keep kosher. They might or might not know that there are laws regarding the kind of foods Jews could eat, but no one knew how to implement them.
It's not so far-fetched - the mitzvah of shatnes, the prohibition on mixing wool and linen in clothing, almost was lost entirely in this country by the early 1940s.
But one man, an Austrian immigrant garment worker named Joseph Rosenberger, appears to have single-handedly saved observance of the Torah law from total obscurity.
Rosenberger is credited with devising a set of tests to check fabric to find out if wool and linen have been spun together or if patches of the two fabrics have been used in the same garment, noted Charlie Tomaszewki, a Phoenix physician who recently trained to check for shatnes and now runs Phoenix Shatnes Laboratory, which checks clothing for the unkosher mixture.
"He turned around the mitzvah from most people never having heard of it to the point where most religious people are cognizant of it," Tomaszewski said.
Although often translated as "good deed," the Hebrew word "mitzvah" actually means "commandment."
Under the shatnes mitzvah, wool and linen are both appropriate for wearing - just not in the same garment and not worn interdependently.
(For example, Tomaszewski explained, it is permissible to wear wool trousers with a linen blazer because either garment can be removed without affecting the other. However, it is not permissible to wear a linen shirt under a wool blazer because the shirt cannot be removed unless the blazer is first.)
The prohibition against mixing wool and linen is a chok, a Torah law for which the reason is unknown.
But, Tomaszewki pointed out, Jews who observe halachah, Jewish law, do so because God commands it, not because the laws "make sense" to them. "God has a reason for (shatnes), but we don't," he said.
There are only two exceptions to the prohibition: tzitzit, the fringes on tallitot and the undergarment observant Jews wear, and the garment of the Kohen Gadol, the high priest of the Temple.
Tomaszewski and his wife, Nancy, daughter Nicki, 7, and son Mark, 5, spent a week at the Lakewood Yeshiva in Lakewood, N.J., last December while he trained to check for shatnes, which involves looking at microfibers under a microscope.
Before Tomaszewski started the Phoenix Shatnes Laboratory, Valley residents had to bring clothing to Los Angeles to be checked.
Some people trace shatnes' origins to the story of Cain and Abel: Cain killed Abel after Abel offered sheep - the source of wool - as a sacrifice to God. Cain offered flax, the source of linen, Tomaszewki explained.
Because the mixture caused humanity's first murder, some posit, it is prohibited. But that's only a theory.
The Hebrew word shatnes, Tomaszewski noted, can be seen as a play on words: the letters - shin, ayin, tet, nun, zayin - can be scrambled to form the words "soton av," which translates, "the evil inclination is strong."
"People look at this law and say 'I don't understand. I don't have an explanation. I'm not going to do it,' " he said. "And that's the essence of shatnes; the evil inclination pushes people the strongest when they try to comprehend the incomprehensible."
To contact the Phoenix Shatnes Laboratory, call Tomaszewski at 861-0283.
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