The Kosher Revolution: The Legacy of Rabbi Menachem Genack

OU Kosher is the largest kashrus  agency in the world. 108 countries,   approximately one and a half million products  under supervision. The change for those who   observe kashrus in America over the last several  decades has been just game-changing. It was really   a totally different kashrus environment than the  environment we have today. What does it take to   have a product become kosher certified? Rabbi  Genack had a dream. He had a vision. He saw   that the world was ready to have kosher-certified  products and that we were the best people to be   able to carry that out. Rabbi Genack developed  a system of control. Rabbi Genack is a world   builder. He's an organization builder. What Rabbi  Genack did was make the OU the preeminent sign of   kashrus in America. What the OU does today  is based on what Rabbi Genack built over   the last 45 years. The largest kashrus  agency in the history of Klal Yisrael. I'll tell you a story. When we grew up,  everybody, orthodox as frum as you were,   we ate everything. We didn't eat non-kosher  meat, but people ate candies and cakes, assuming   that they were all kosher. You used to go into a  store, pick up an object, read the ingredients,   and try to decide whether there were issues that  made it questionable or whether you could eat it.   It was a horrible way to try to do things. There  were hardly any products that had certifications.   Let's say in a product, you'll have 20 different  ingredients, and some of the ingredients will have   20 ingredients in them. You have to call up 300  companies all over the world to find out if the   thing is kosher. When Rabbi Genack first met my  father, he was a high school student. Already at   that time, my father recognized in Rabbi Genack a  unique brilliance. He gave shiurim to the semicha   program in YU. He gave shiurim in Landers Yeshiva  also. He gave shiurim in his shul. Whenever there   was a possibility, he would always say another  shuir. He didn't want to give up teaching. So when I came to OU, the OU was really  in its infancy. The office was located   on 36th Street in Midtown Manhattan. It was a  mom-and-pop operation because we didn't have   computers. It was almost impossible to run a  kashrus organization. Well, when I first came,   I was the only full-time rabbinic person  on staff here at the OU. At the time,   we had approximately 300 companies under  the OU. I was somewhat reluctant to join   because I was giving shiurim and I wanted to  really focus on that all the time and when I   ultimately agreed I said I would do it for 6  months. 45 years later, it's a little bit longer. Rabbi Genack was looking for another  Rabbinic Coordinator to work here at the OU,   and this individual thought I would be a good  match. It was a most interesting interview.   Rabbi Genack didn't talk much about kashrus.  He really wanted to talk about who I am,   and we hit it off very well in that  meeting. I guess the best proof is, A,   he offered me a position, and B, I've been  here since then, and the rest is history. Within the last 10 years, the kosher  food market has exploded. Currently,   there are hundreds of thousands of products on  supermarket shelves that are certified kosher.   Consumers know that the food they're buying  meets these kosher requirements when they see   this symbol on the product. What does it take  to have a product become kosher certified? Rabbi Genack slowly helped develop  a system. That's what kashrus is all   about. It's a system of control. Rabbi Genack  hired Rav Hershel Schachter, shlita. I   used to come every Friday to the OU. There was  just Rabbi Genack and another two Rabbanim, and   we would review all the issues that came up in  the course of the week. Rabbi Belsky joined as   well. One of the early times that I visited the  OU, I noticed this towering man. And I asked my   father when I went back into his office, he  said that's Rabbi Yisroel Belsky. After I   noticed my father talking to Rabbi Belsky and  Rav Schachter, what they were talking about,   topics in kashrus that would affect millions  of Jews throughout the world, I understood   exactly what the OU was accomplishing  and the scope that they were reaching. The OU applies age-old kosher traditions to  the most advanced and sophisticated methods   of modern food production. In addition, the  company has a contractual obligation to ensure   that all the ingredients that are used in  the plant are those approved by the OU. The industrial revolution of kashrus started  under Rabbi Genack's tenure at the OU. Must have,   at that point in time, we had about 55 rabbanim  professionally in the office. In the field, we had   over 500+ people working in the field, it was a  real organization. He saw that the world was ready   to have kosher certified products manufactured  all over the world, sold all over the world, and   that we at the OU were the best people to be able  to carry that out. He built up the organization   within a period of about 10 years. He oversaw  the introduction of a computer system, inputting   tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of  ingredients to different companies. All this was   a major effort to set up the structure for the  OU. Rabbi Genack has made so many initiatives.   One is kashrus education, going out to shuls or  whether to communities or whether to schools,   to teach about kashrus and how it functions. What  his philosophy is, is not to do things solo but to   work as a group and to bring all those resources  and all those talents and all those experiences   together. I saw the potential of growing it  both in terms of standards and in terms of   scope. It's grown to be international, something  in the range of 115 countries around the globe.   And in terms of it serving the Jewish community  gives therefore much more ability to to do that   both within kashrus and beyond. The first time  I met Rabbi Genack was sitting in, where else? A   Torah shiur, where he was giving a halacha shiur  on Basar BeChalav in YU Semicha for Yoreh Deah,   and prompted to say, "My Rebbi, the Rav," and  he truly was a talmid. Rabbi Genack once told   me a story that he was 17 years old in the Rav's  shuir, and the Rav asked a question, and he said,   "If anybody would answer this question, he could  have my seat." Rabbi Genack answered the question.   The Rav didn't give him a seat, but in many ways,  Rabbi Genack is memaleh makom of the Rav. Rabbi Genack   is a true successor. His relationship with Rav  Yoshe Ber is unparalleled. But Rabbi Soloveitchik   was that type of person, that he seemed to know  everything there was to know about everything.   Secular knowledge as well as Torah, of course,  and I think that excited Rabbi Genack. Even   though Rabbi Soloveitchik is no longer alive,  but Rabbi Genack lives with Rabbi Soloveitchik.   One thing that Rabbi Genack often repeats from his  Rebbi is that the OU should not become a monopoly.   You know there's a concept of "kinas sofrim tarbeh  chochmah," if someone else achieves or someone   else accomplishes, I want to do that. I want to  become that. Rav Yoshe Ber specifically advocated   and pushed that my father and Rabbi Genack should  join together. My father and Rabbi Genack were   always yedidim and they were always working  together on behalf of kashrus. Rabbi Genack had   a dream. He had a vision that he wanted the OU to  have a publishing division and the primary purpose   for that division would be to publish the works of  Rav Soloveitchik. OU Press has been a tremendous   contribution to the Jewish community, and I've  certainly felt it a privilege and an honor to work   with him in helping realize his dream and vision.  He was the one who established the OU Press,   publishing Rabbi Soloveitchik's shuirim in halacha  and hashkafah, very valuable. The Rav was a person   of great integrity, also chesed-oriented. Rabbi  Genack was a baal chesed both in a public way,   but we could see things the things he didn't even  know about; people needed jobs, people had family   problems. Because Rabbi Genack had such a wide  range of interests and intellectual curiosity,   meeting somebody that was brilliant and  was able to accomplish so many different   things attracted him, and I never asked him why  he admired Abraham Lincoln but I think the same   reason he admired the Rav, in a secular way,  Abraham Lincoln was also, he was a visionary   person. The one thing that marked Abraham Lincoln  was his extraordinary humility and his ability to   work with people. Of course, my mentor for many,  many years was Rabbi Soloveitchik, the Rav, and   I saw many of those qualities in him also because  no one can match the Rav in terms of sheer genius. Let's go back to that thought, just in terms of,  why is it so satisfying? What is so satisfying   about the job? I mean, what's satisfying about  the job? What's interesting about the job is,   it's seeing how halachic principles, those  ancient principles are coming to life in a   very contemporary context in terms of  the technology of a large factory. The   flow from the halacha to the manufacturing  and the technology, and ultimately to the   distribution and the business aspects.  All of these mixed together, you know,   make for, in times, fireworks, but also for a very  interesting and important role that the OU plays. Rabbi Genack's vision for what OU Kashrus could  be, inevitably left an indelible mark on what the   OU is today. Our growth has been made possible  with Rabbi Genack in terms of where we should be   thinking and how we should be growing. OU Kosher  is in 108 countries, approximately one and a half   million products under supervision. Well, Rabbi  Genack has established a hierarchy of the OU   office. There's the senior administration of the  office. There are the administrators. Then, of   course, there are the field representatives. He's  created this whole infrastructure to be able to do   what we're doing with, you know, 15,000 companies  in, you know, more than 100 countries around the   world. What the OU particularly did was make it  clear to companies that it was in their business   interest to be kosher. A large food company goes  kosher. The cost of the kosher certification is   de minimis in the overall budget of the company  and therefore the kosher consumer doesn't have to   pay anything. It was not easy in the beginning. I  think it was a new concept. The RC's you know the   companies they had were based on industry while  the mashgichim in the field often were a   function of geography, so we had to coordinate  those two elements. We brought in halachic consultants,   we consulted many different Rabbanim, and in  Eretz Yisrael we've expanded that with Rav  Asher Weiss and Rav Mordechai Gross in Eretz  Yisrael. Now, internally, as I said, we have,   our staff is filled with talmidei chachamim. It  is mindboggling as to the success of the growth   of the kosher industry and Rabbi Genack constantly  says that we are supposed to be an or la’amim,   that we're both a kosher certifying  agency but we're emissaries to be   mekadesh Shem Shamayim each and every  day. Rabbi Genack is a world builder,   he's an organization builder. There's  a gravitas, there's a stature that just   elevates everybody around. There's a nobility.  He coalesced the coalitions that were required   to make the OU grow as a kashrus organization  serving Klal Yisrael. That's a very special   talent. Not everybody could do it. We owe a  tremendous amount of gratitude to Rabbi Genack. Rabbi Genack's legacy, the OU, on OU Kosher,  on the Torah of Rav Soltoveitchik, on all the   public things that he does, they're all well  known. But the legacy that Rabbi Genack leaves   behind in terms of the personal connections and  the mentorship that he has done over the years,   that is, I think, his lasting legacy. It's a  legacy. How could there be a greater legacy than   a person who built the largest kashrus agency  in the history of Klal Yisrael? Rabbi Genack's   mark of having brought in the poskim, bringing in  the experts. I would think many people don't even   know about the kindness that he has shown to  people. You know, I can't praise him enough. I   just can't praise him enough. The OU has become  so large and has become such a vital organ for   Klal Yisrael, bringing kosher food to Jews across  the globe. Rabbi Genack has been a dear friend and   advisor. Rabbi Genack's imprimatur on the Jewish  people throughout his career at the OU and in his   lifetime will have an effect on the Jewish people  far far into the future. The future is massive and   we take inspiration from our leaders, from Rabbi  Genack's leadership over these many many years,   these several decades. So, but there's going  to be many things that are going to change in   the years to come, and I'm sure that that  modus operandi will continue, that the OU   will have the best people available to address  new issues as they rise in the years to come.   The OU is fortunate to have Rabbi Elefant succeed  Rabbi Genack. He's retiring and leaving behind a   partner of 35 years. OU Kosher will continue  to adapt to new technologies, new industrial   standards, new political realities. Things  change all the time. Things that are external   to kashrus but affect kashrus. And I believe  that we are well situated to be able to address   those issues under Rabbi Elefant's leadership.  You know, I thought I had a hard job till now.   I guess I'm only learning that it's even more  and the responsibility is enormous. But I have   39 years of studying under a great rebbi and  knowing that I could build on the foundation   that this man built. If I will be able to maintain  what he did and be able to build on what he built,   then I will be a success. The Ribono Shel Olom  has the right person for the right task at the   right time. He was the person the Ribono Shel  Olom deemed appropriate to see OU and to see   the world of kashrus. I think as my father steps  down from the role of CEO, we have to remember   where it started and where it is now, and how  OU Kosher is the global trademark of kosher. OU Kosher is of course the largest kashrus agency  in the world. OU represents high standards,   commitment to the Jewish community. It's  nonprofit. The revenue that's generated goes   right back to the Jewish community in terms  of the many different multifarious programs,   important programs, of the OU. And so, I'm  very very proud to be associated with the OU.