NJ: Red Heifer Was Disqualified

By COLlive reporter

A baby black cow has crushed the hopes and dreams of many Jews around the world when it was born this past Wednesday, 8:00 AM on a New Jersey ranch.

The newborn’s mother is a red colored cow that has gained international attention as a possible qualifying candidate to be a Red Heifer (Parah Aduma) for the third Beis Hamikdash with the coming of Moshiach.

The Red Heifer is an extremely rare creature, Israel Today notes. According to Jewish tradition, during the 2000 years from the time the mitzvah was given until the destruction of the Second Beis Hamikdash in the first century AD, only 9 red cows met the biblical criteria.

This cow was born on April 2, 2013, which fell on Isru Chag Pesach 5773, in Howell Township and has attracted an estimated 37,000 people from around the country over the past few months since it was first reported.

A parah adumah is necessary to produce the ash needed for the ritual purification process, essential to performing the service in the Beis Hamikdash. Many found significance in the finding of this cow.

Its owner Herbert Celler said $1 million was offered for the cow. “But I told him that she’s not for sale. This is a gift from Hashem,” he said. “When he asked me what I’m going to do with her, I told him that I’m going to be the first in line when Moshiach comes.”

2 months ago, Rabbi Dovid Feinstein made a special trip from New York to see the rare red cow. He was visibly impressed with the finding, the Lakewood Scoop reported. He refrained from stating his opinion as to the status of it being a Parah Adumah.

Rabbi Feinstein is the son of the late legendary posek Rabbi Moshe Feinstein and the Rosh Yeshiva of the Mesivtha Tifereth Jerusalem educational institutions. “Maybe you’ll merit when Moshiach will come,” Rabbi Feinstein told Celler.

Herb Celler said he was shocked to learn about the red cow’s giving birth, making it disqualified to be a Parah Adumah according to the Mishneh Torah of the Rambam.

The Torah states that the red heifer needs to be a cow “with which no work was performed.” The Rambam deduces from this in Hilchos Parah Adummah of Sefer Taharah that “If a male mounted it, it is unacceptable. Needless to say, a pregnant heifer is unacceptable.”

“We had no idea it was even pregnant,” Celler, a son of Holocaust survivors who speaks fluent Yiddish, told the Lakewood Scoop. “It had to have become pregnant when it was about a year and a half – it’s very unusual.”