I know that some American Jews (and I presume others) who attend non-orthodox synagogues and would identify as at least somewhat religious do not observe the kosher regulations (save perhaps on holy days). What justification do they use for disobeying the Torah’s dietary restrictions?
The same one that Catholics provide for using birth control?
All people make their own justifications for which aspects of their religion’s “official” teachings they observe. No one in this country, including fanatic fundamentalists, truly follows each and every provision and teaching of the Old and New Testaments. (How many stonings have you witnessed recently?)
Why do people stop keeping kosher? Probably as many reasons as people. They consider it inconvenient, or old-fashioned, or not truly meaningful as a symbol of Judaism, or don’t want to make their Judaism a matter of public comment.
Every single person in this country has a slightly different set of religious beliefs. Fidelity to a religion is a chimera.
Slightly off topic…
Once I was not feeling well, and couldn’t finish up my dinner. There was this huge, unshelled prawn which I hadn’t touched - there were two of them, actually, and the two Mulsim ‘cow-workers’ that were with me wanted them.
“But I am not sure if it is halal…” I began
“Never mind, we are westernised Mulisims!” They retort. The case is closed for them.
It may not be strange that as society advances, some people began to adopt a “DIY” style of religion, espeicially when you are not in countries where the slightest deviance from the religious norms would get you killed.
Why?
Becuase it tastes good - Lobster anyway.
I can’t speak for anyone else.
BTW there are people who keep a kosher home but will eat nonkosher outside the house. I will guess 1)because some treyf just tastes good or 2) as a matter of convenience - such as eating at friend or neighbor’s house or a function at a nonkosher restaurant, etc. I know convenience is not the right word but I can’t at the moment think of a better one.
Some Reform Jews at least feel that adherence to the letter of the Law can actually get in the way of one’s faith - and that it’s legitimate for each Jew to decide for themselves whether or not each of these rules have value, so violating them is not necessarily sinful. I assume this applies to many of the other 600-some laws in the Torah as well.
Some Jews believe that Kosher laws are nothing more than primitive health regulations, mainly related to living in the desert.
http://www.jewfaq.org/kashrut.htm#AllJews
http://www.riseagain.net/dichroic/archives/001640.html
Reform Judaism used to teach that the Jewish dietary laws were no longer valid in the modern world. So Reform Jews were not only not encouraged to keep kosher, they were actively discouraged from doing so (cite)
Now, as I understand it (IANA Reform Jew), it’s up to each individual Reform Jew to decide whether and to what extent s/he wants to keep kosher.
Here’s a sermon given in 2001 by a Reform rabbi that discusses changes over time in Reform attitudes toward keeping kosher.
Anecdotal: I know a highly religous (not quite orthodox, but close) Jewish guy who’ll eat cheeseburgers. Apparently a number of the dietary laws come from the Talmud - interpretation of what’s in the Torah - and he feels an obligation to observe the commandments in the Torah, that are ‘from god’, and not what various scholars have interpreted them as.
He’s not a Karaite, is he? The belief you describe sounds pretty close to their practice regarding keeping kosher.
My wife’s standard response to that is “so the dishes will go to heaven” 
Seriously, however, that is how it was in my parent’s home as well (before I became Orthodox, of course).
Zev Steinhardt
I can sort of see that, adfter all, didn’t someone on the board [or maybe it was my cooking list] say that the original was not to basically eat the calf [or was it kid?] in it’s mothers milk…which I would interpret that if you had cheeses made from goat/sheep/buffalo you could make beef lasagne, as you were not eating the same meat as mik animal types, BUT the way it is interpreted is that people just more or less avoided any meat/milk combinations so it wouldnt LOOK like they were breaking the law, and it just kept getting more and more firmly ingrained until the total prohibition became law - despite the original was only mother/progeny prohibition…
And I still cant understand why you can’t mix stuff, like linen and wool, or cotton and wool… 
Basically, I would say, that there are a large number of Conservative Jews, and probably almost all Reform Jews, who either don’t believe (a) that the Torah was dictated, letter for letter, by God, but that it was transmitted basically through divine inspiration and written down by people, perhaps over many many years; and (b) that rabbinic tradition is binding. These Jews also accept that Judaism is evolving and changing with the times. Thus, certain ritual aspects can be discarded as being (say) outmoded.
There are also, I am sure, many Jews who just don’t think about it. It is not easy to find a compromise between being a “modern American” and being a “traditional Jew.” Sometimes, it’s easiest not to think too much.
Orthodox Jews, of course, believe that the Commandments were given directly and letter-perfect by God to Moses, and that rabbinic tradition and interpretation is part of the divine law (in fact, was all part of an oral tradition that goes back to Moses), and that Judaism is eternal, not evolving. Hence, Orthodox Jews and many Conservative Jews would keep kosher much more, ah, religiously.
“Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother’s milk.”
This became paraphrased as thou shall not eat milk and meat.
And that is how a perfectly compassionate rule about not boiling a baby goat in the liquid that was intended by God to sustain it in life got transmuted into an injunction against drinking milk with your bucket of KFC.
;j
Because they’ve decided to spit on the graves of the bubbies and zeides (Who, thank G-d, aren’tr alive to see that their little angels have grown up to eat shrimp) and break their parents hearts.
That and the interpretation of Judaism tends to be a personal thing.
Depends on what you mean by keeping kosher. I’ll eat stuff that is not hechshered (doesn’t have the “U” in a circle or other marking that indicates that someone certified that it’s kosher) *if * I can look at the ingredients and be satisfied that *none * of them are *inherently * treif. For example, I might buy a can of tuna fish as long as the ingredients are only tuna, vegetable oil, and salt. I’m satisfied that neither the fish, the oil, nor the salt is inherently treif, and the combination of them is not inherently treif (unlike, say, a cheeseburger). I’m satisfied that the civil laws regarding food handling and processing are enforced such that the can contains only the tuna, oil, and salt listed on the label.
Am I disregarding the laws of kashruth by purchasing that can of tuna if it doesn’t have a hechsher? Depends on who you ask. My rabbi says it’s OK. The Lubavitch family that befriended cwPartner and I some years ago would probably disagree.
FWIW, I do look for hechshers when purchasing foods that must be made according to a ritual standard, such as kosher-for-Passover foods. I won’t buy or eat anything that looks remotely like a meat product, and I will only buy dairy products that are hechshered. My kitchen at home is strictly parve/dairy, so the issue of mixing foods inappropriately at home doesn’t come up.
For that matter, Christians are biblically prohibited from eating anything with blood in it (Acts 15:29 and a couple other passages in Acts). How many Christians do you know who follow that one?
So I guess breath control play with animals would be right out, huh?
I would argue that the rule only make senses at that time and in that particular climate. There was both Jewish and Gentile Christians at that time, and of course the Jewish Christians would be somewhat upset if the Gentlies just trampled over their tradition. But AFAIK, the significance of the blood means ‘live’, and perhaps why the rule.
I think that if a Christian decides to honour any ‘legal’ rules, he does it for God, and it’s a business strictly between himself and God, for Paul did state that Christians are not under “law” anymore. That, however, comes from a Christian which many has considered eccentric, so other’s mileage may varies.
now imagining a chicken with udders
I hear you can milk anything with nipples