#787: “I'm Sure it's Kosher” (or not)
There is a principle in halachah, “Milsa d’lo ramya alei d’inish lav adatei”, (If something is not within a person’s frame of reference, he is not conscious of it.)
To illustrate: Reuven calls Shimon to a Din Torah, and claims: "I lent Shimon a maneh, and it is in his possession."
Shimon claims, "I repaid Reuven the money in the presence of Levi and Yehudah!”
Levi and Yehudah are summoned by Beis Din to testify, and they say, “It never happened!”
Whom do we believe? The halachah is that Levi and Yehudah cannot be counted on to remember an incident unless they had been designated in advance to serve as witnesses in the matter; therefore, it is not presumed that Shimon is lying.
Similarly, if someone immersed a non-kosher spoon into a pot of hot food (or a dairy spoon into a meat dish or vice versa) without being aware of the spoon’s kosher status, we cannot rely on them to remember exactly what they did.
In order to rule the food, the pot, and the spoon kosher in the above scenario, it would be necessary to know whether the volume of the kosher food was sixty times greater than the non-kosher item that was immersed in it. So even if the person claims to remember how much of the spoon came into contact with the food (among other factors that are considered in this situation, if it was only partly immersed, there may be room for leniency), we don’t trust the answer, because at the time the one stirring the food wasn’t conscious of the fact that the spoon was not kosher incompatible (kosher-wise) with the food.
The same principle applies to someone slaughtering an animal. If the shochet (slaughterer) had not studied the laws in advance and is therefore unaware of proper procedures, we don’t trust the assertion that the animal was slaughtered strictly according to halachah. Another example involves kosher for Pesach food: If someone cooks without the knowledge that it is needed for Pesach, we cannot accept their claim that the food is completely chametz-free.
However, there are some exceptions to the rule, and we may sometimes take another’s word regarding their actions, even when they were not conscious of its halachic aspect. Allowances include these cases: There are independent reasons to assume that special attention was paid to the actions; if the issues stem from an issur d’rabbanan (Rabbinic prohibition) and not d’oraysa (of Biblical origin); or if there is no chezkas issur (original assumption of halachic restrictions) involved.