{"id":34807,"date":"2014-02-11T08:29:32","date_gmt":"2014-02-11T08:29:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ou.org\/life\/?p=34807"},"modified":"2014-02-12T19:04:52","modified_gmt":"2014-02-12T19:04:52","slug":"super-mashgiach-rabbi-chaim-goldzweig","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/life\/inspiration\/super-mashgiach-rabbi-chaim-goldzweig\/","title":{"rendered":"The Super Mashgiach: Rabbi Chaim Goldzweig"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\"goldzweig\"<\/a>
Rabbi Chaim Goldzweig
Photo: Joe Kus at the Chicago Jewish News<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

Before PCs, iPads and iPods, there was Rabbi Chaim Goldzweig. An Orthodox Union rabbinic field representative who recently marked his fiftieth anniversary with the OU, Rabbi Goldzweig is known in food manufacturing plants across the globe as the OU\u2019s walking, talking kosher database.<\/em><\/p>\n

In 1960, when Rabbi Goldzweig first joined the OU\u2019s kosher division, known today as \u201cOU Kosher,\u201d it was a fledgling operation with just a handful of full-time mashgichim in the field. At the time, the world of kosher certification was in its infancy.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs long as the ingredients panel didn\u2019t list lard, everybody thought it was fine,\u201d says Rabbi Goldzweig, who lives in Chicago.<\/p>\n

Intent on learning everything there was to know about ingredients, Rabbi Goldzweig quickly became the \u201cgo-to\u201d ingredient maven, with four phone lines to accommodate the daily deluge of calls he would receive from kosher agencies and consumers around the world.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe could walk into a plant and just by looking at the code on an ingredient container, he would know exactly who manufactured it and if it was kosher,\u201d says Rabbi Moshe Elefant, COO of OU Kosher, which today boasts a high-tech database with nearly 350,000 kosher food ingredients.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no question that Rabbi Goldzweig was a pivotal player in the development of kashrut in America. Hewas<\/em>\u00a0the OU,\u201d says Rabbi Israel Paretzky, an OU rabbinic coordinator (RC).<\/strong><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
\u201cKosher Columbo\u201d<\/strong><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Rabbi Goldzweig\u2019s colleagues (read: disciples) view his brilliance, meticulousness, and unpretentious charm responsible for OU Kosher\u2019s phenomenal success. \u201cHe has no airs about him,\u201d says Rabbi Avrohom Juravel, an OU RC. \u201cHe comes across like a human being, not like a professor with white gloves looking for that speck of dust. He\u2019ll find the speck of dust but won\u2019t come to managers with an attitude when showing it to them.\u201d<\/div>\n
\"\"<\/a>
An OU mashgiach inspects equipment at a New Jersey beverage bottling plant.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cCompanies feel safe with him. They trust him,\u201d says Rabbi Yaakov Horowitz, head mashgiach of the Manischewitz Company. \u201cIn the final analysis, kosher is very much a function of trust. You\u2019re not going to entrust a major part of your multi-million dollar business to someone you don\u2019t trust.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rabbi Goldzweig engendered such confidence that an oil company in India insisted that he\u2014and only he\u2014be in charge of overseeing its kosher production, which would require him to spend the year in the country. Rabbi Goldzweig explained that he couldn\u2019t possibly stay away from his family for so long. \u201cThe company spent over one million dollars on his airfare just so that he could fly home for Shabbat and be back [in India] on Monday,\u201d says Rabbi Horowitz. \u201cIt was based purely on the personal relationship.\u201d<\/p>\n

Crisco, a shortening made entirely of vegetable oil instead of lard, was invented in 1910. Three years after the product was on the market, Proctor & Gamble began advertising that Crisco was a cheap and kosher product for which the \u201cHebrew Race has been waiting 4,000 years.\u201d In 1985,\u00a0 Crisco became OU certified. Courtesy of the J.M. Smucker Company Corporate Archives<\/em><\/p>\n

His disarming manner put people at ease. \u201cHe\u2019d walk into a plant looking like the TV-detective Columbo, wearing an old hat and a disheveled jacket with overstuffed pockets, where he kept all his notes and pieces of paper,\u201d says Rabbi Michael Morris, an OU RC.<\/p>\n

Rabbi Goldzweig, his colleagues say, would act as if he didn\u2019t know much. In short order, company executives would realize that he knew more about their production than the technical people in the company.<\/span>\"\"<\/p>\n

Globetrotting for Kashrut<\/strong>
\nRabbi Goldzweig\u2019s entry into the kashrut field began when the OU hired him as a rabbinic field representative (RFR) for Procter & Gamble. Soon the OU began sending him to plants around the world. Every Sunday morning, he would call the supervising RC to plan his itinerary for the week. By Sunday evening, he was bound for somewhere in the US, or in Europe or the Far East.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have more stamps on my passport than Carter has liver pills,\u201d says Rabbi Goldzweig. Along the way, OU Kosher\u2019s Columbo amassed many memorable episodes\u2014some funny, some moving and others downright scary.<\/p>\n

Once, after landing in Malaysia, Rabbi Goldzweig was approached by two men sporting rifles and bayonets. They asked if he was Jewish. Although nervous, he kept his wits about him. \u201cLet\u2019s see . . . I\u2019m not Irish,\u201d he told them. \u201cI\u2019m not Polish, Swedish, Greek . . . I think I must be Jewish.\u201d Not amused, they asked him what he was doing there. \u201cYou know I\u2019m beginning to wonder that myself,\u201d he said. \u201cIf you don\u2019t want me here, I don\u2019t mind going back on the next plane \u2019cause you guys paid for the tickets.\u201d He pulled out a letter from Procter & Gamble confirming his supervision of a vegetable glycerin run. They let him go.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
An OU mashgiach makes the rounds.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

His winsome disposition not only got him out of jams, it also inspired lifelong friendships. One of the managers at Procter & Gamble sued his ex-wife for custody of their children. He asked Rabbi Goldzweig if he would be a character witness. Rabbi Goldzweig agreed. \u201cThe judge was trying to surmise why in the world they called in a rabbi,\u201d says Rabbi Goldzweig. \u201cHe asked me how I knew the man. I explained that I worked at Procter & Gamble as a kosher supervisor and that I\u2019d been to his home and knew his family. He asked me some questions about kashrut then banged his gavel and announced that because the manager got a rabbi to be a character witness, he\u2019s going to give him the children. I can\u2019t tell you how happy he was.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Mashgiach\u2019s Mashgiach<\/strong>
\nThe string of RCs under Rabbi Goldzweig\u2019s tutelage still consider him the king of kashrut. \u201cThere is no bigger boki [expert] in the field\u2014then and today,\u201d says Rabbi Dovid Jenkins, OU RC. \u201cHe taught me how to go through a facility, how to look at ingredients, how to decipher which are problematic or not\u2014all in clear, understandable terms.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also transmitted the tricks of the trade. \u201cHe was famous for using the \u2018salami method,\u2019\u201dsays Rabbi Juravel. \u201cHe\u2019d walk into a plant with several kosher salamis in his pockets and give them out as presents. The workers became his best friends.\u201d<\/p>\n

The plant managers were also smitten. \u201cHe is one smart person,\u201d says Ray Henry, retired president and CEO of Daddy Ray\u2019s, the country\u2019s largest manufacturer of fig and fruit bars. \u201cHe is bubbly and friendly and probably the only guy who would let me hug him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rabbi Goldzweig approached the plants\u2019 kosher glitches in the same gracious manner. \u201cHe never looked down on anyone; he treated them as equals,\u201d says Rabbi Mordechai Grunberg, an OU RFR. \u201cOnce, we were sitting at an initial meeting with the plant administration, and Rabbi Goldzweig was trying to get information on a certain raw material. He suspected that it could be animal based. In a nice way, he asked if . . . they were sure they had all the ingredients listed. He suggested they review it again. He knew that the raw material had to be there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Once the executives realized that the rabbi knew exactly which ingredients should be in the particular product, and that they weren\u2019t going to get away with hiding anything, they came clean. \u201cMostly, they appreciated how he let them know in such a polite indirectly direct way,\u201d says Rabbi Grunberg. Word got out in the industry that when Rabbi Goldzweig comes to a plant, give him everything, because he\u2019s going to help you; if you can\u2019t get a raw material from a kosher source, he has another source in his left shirt pocket, and he\u2019ll make a call for you on the spot.<\/p>\n

Although his kashrut work took him away from home for most of the week, it didn\u2019t detract from his devotion to family. \u201cExcept for the times he had to fly to Hawaii to supervise macadamia nuts, he never missed a Shabbos at home,\u201d says his daughter, Beila Lichter.<\/p>\n

Growing up, the Goldzweig children couldn\u2019t help but notice that their father was an important person in the community. \u201cWherever we went, people stopped to ask him questions about products and ingredients,\u201d says his son, Pinchus. \u201cWhenever we went to food stores, he would walk around looking at ingredients. Once, while in a supermarket, he picked up a certain product, and a woman came running over, saying: \u2018Rabbi Goldzweig said you\u2019re not supposed to use that item!\u2019 He quickly put it down and went to the next aisle, where another shopper approached him with a question, addressing my father by name. The first woman overheard and apologized. He said: \u2018At least I know people are listening to me.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
An OU mashgiach on the job.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Today, OU RCs continue to call him for advice. \u201cI still need to hear his judgment on an issue,\u201d says Rabbi Paretzky. \u201cI also encourage members of the new kashrut staff who haven\u2019t heard of him to call Rabbi Goldzweig. Besides, the man is a real upper. If you\u2019re ever in a bad mood, call Rabbi Goldzweig; you\u2019ll be in a good mood within five minutes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe kashrut department was built on his shoulders,\u201d says Rabbi Menachem Genack, CEO of OU Kosher. \u201cHe is a man of commitment, knowledge and concern for every aspect of the job. He is what we call the \u2018super mashgiach.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n