It is no secret that the great state of Georgia’s Jewish community is thriving. The once mighty Northeast, Midwest and West Coast Jewish-American strongholds are giving way to young families who prefer the South’s lower cost of living and easygoing nature. Georgia is home to one of the oldest congregations in the United States, Mickve Israel, founded by Sephardic Jews from London and still operating in Savannah today. You can ‘feel good’ at the Augusta’s Congregation B’nai Israel where honorary member of Jewish fraternity ZBT and the Godfather of Soul James Brown was known to stop by.
But in truth, Atlanta takes the cake or in this case the peach cobbler. Home to 92% of the state’s Jews, the ATL hosts a robust and growing Jewish communal life including a JCC, two summer camps, synagogues of every imaginable persuasion, Jewish day schools, kosher restaurants and grocery stores.
However Atlanta’s most important ongoing gift to the Jewish world is more than just the wonderful families it produces like longtime JCC members the Epsteins who will celebrate son Jeremy’s Bar Mitzvah this Shabbat. Whether you are in Tahiti or Tokyo, Bangkok or Berlin, Kuala Lumpur or Kansas City you will find one product on the shelf whose kosher bona fides are never in doubt (recently disputed of course). It just might be America’s number one cultural export: Coca-Cola.
The story of how Coca-Cola gained kosher certification usually starts and ends as a wholesome tale of immigrant European Jewish refugees drinking their newfound homeland’s preferred beverage in an effort to assimilate while still remaining committed to Jewish law and the traditional values they brought with them from the old country. The reality is that an enormous transcontinental rabbinic dispute erupted over whether Coca-Cola was not only Kosher but Kosher for Passover and how much the burgeoning Jewish community could push to make changes at arguably the most iconic American company.
The disagreement pitted the paradoxically permissive Ultra-Orthodox Rabbi Shmuel Pardes of Chicago against the more prohibitive Modern Orthodox Rabbi Tobias Geffen of Atlanta’s Congregation Shearith Israel. Given Rabbi Geffen’s close proximity to the factory where Coca-Cola’s syrup was manufactured, he began receiving rabbinic inquiries from Pittsburgh, Memphis and across the United States asking if Coca-Cola was kosher given how many of their congregants were already drinking it.
Working behind the scenes with Harold Hirsch, Coca-Cola’s General Counsel, Rabbi Geffen gained access to the most closely guarded trade secret in the world, the Coca-Cola formula. Rabbi Geffen wrote that he could not in good conscience recommend the product as Kosher given the presence of beef tallow-derived glycerin nor Kosher for Passover given its grain-derived alcohol. This did not endear Rabbi Geffen to the midwesten Rabbi Pardes whose eponymously named journal “Ha’Pardes” had for years regularly carried Yiddish advertisements for Coca-Cola with articles extolling Coca-Cola as adhering to the ‘ultimate standards of Kashrut’.
Although a member of Atlanta’s Reform Hebrew Benevolent Congregation, Coca-Cola’s Harold Hirsch possessed immense respect for the traditionally observant Rabbi Geffen. Each understood at a deep level the sociological importance of Coca-Cola being universally recognized as kosher and so together they managed to convince Coca-Cola to switch to vegetable-derived glycerin year-round and beet sugar-derived alcohol for Passover.
Ironically, twenty years later controversy would erupt once more. Coincidence or not, one year after Rabbi Shmuel Pardes passed away in 1956, his colleague Rabbi Eliezer Silver at the Ultra-Orthodox organization known as the Agudath Harabonim published a letter saying Coca-Cola had in fact never been kosher given that Proctor and Gamble manufactured animal and vegetable derived glycerins on the same line. P&G created separate lines and the problem was solved. Rabbi Geffen passed away in 1970 at the age of 99, having served his last 60 years in the pulpit at Atlanta’s Shearith Israel.
Please join us Saturday morning when we will raise a glass of, what else but Coca-Cola, to wish a l’chaim to Jeremy and the entire Epstein Family on the momentous occasion of his Bar Mitzvah.
Mazal Tov!
Services
Kabbalat Shabbat
Friday, June 21st
Services: 6:00pm
Dinner by reservation: 7:00pm
Shabbat Parshat Beha’alotcha
Bar Mitzvah of Jeremy Epstein
Saturday, June 22nd
Services: 10:00am
Kiddush: 12:00pm
Kabbalat Shabbat
Friday, June 28th
Services: 6:00pm
Dinner by reservation: 7:00pm
Shabbat Parshat Shlach
First Anniversary of Théo Daquin’s Bar Mitzvah
Kiddush sponsored the Rosenberg Family in commemoration of the yahrzeits of Jerry’s mother “Bubbie” Babe Rosenberg and Marsha’s father Mickey Blum
Saturday, June 29th
Services: 10:00am
Kiddush: 12:00pm
Friday Night and Dinner Reservations can made on our website: https://jccjapan.jp/shabbat-meals-sign-up/
Events
Violins and Hope
From the Holocaust to the Symphony Hall: a photographic journey documenting the man and work of Israeli master luthier (violin maker) Amnon Weinstein who set up a project to restore violins that survived the concentration camps and ghettos of the Holocaust, even when their owners often did not.
Sunday, June 23rd
7:00pm – 9:00pm
Coffee with the Rabbi
Rabbi Andrew will discuss how to address antisemitism, an important issue, even more so in these turbulent times. After the introduction, enjoy a Q&A with the Rabbi while eating Israeli Bamba and sipping award-winning specialty coffee from Saza Coffee.
Tuesday, June 25th
1:00pm – 2:00pm
JCJ Open Mic Night!
WHAT: Spoken word poetry, music, skits, dance, storytelling
WHO: All ages and all skill levels
THEME: Jewish in Japan
Advance sign-ups are required to perform. If you are interested, please fill out this Google form https://forms.gle/ibJgPSzRC6vXfU566 to submit your name, contact, and type of performance.
Sunday, July 7th
7:00pm – 9:00pm
Event Registration Page: https://jccjapan.jp/event-registration/
If you have an idea for an event or a topic you would like to share with others, please visit our website: https://jccjapan.jp/event-committee-inquiry/
Announcements
Mazal Tov to the Bavli Family on Miya’s Bat Mitzvah last week. The Ashkenazi members of the congregation continue to recover from the Jachnun and Burekas which were so sweetly tempered by the most delicious Yerushalmi/Noodle Kugel Tokyo has ever tasted.
We express our deepest condolences on the death of Fumihiko Maki who served as the architect of the JCC’s current building. Longtime JCC member Naomi Pollock wrote the following about the life and career of Fumihiko Maki: https://www.architecturalrecord.com/articles/16954-tribute-fumihiko-maki-19282024
So long to the ‘Say Hey Kid’ Willie Mays who passed away at 93 year old. In 1964, Mays described the Jewish San Franscican Shemano Family as the ‘best friends I’ve ever had in my life.’”
Yiddish Club with Jack Halpern: Please contact Jack at jack@cjki.org if you are interested to join. All levels are welcome, from beginner to advanced. Much more than just language, the club’s monthly meetings explore Yiddish culture as well.
Shabbat Behaalotcha
Candle Lighting: 6:42pm
Havdala: 7:46pm