MONSEY, N.Y., — The strict rules regarding modesty in dress were put on hold on Friday, as men, women and children stripped from there clothing amidst the rumors that a local Hasidic Shatnez laboratory was a complete fraud.
"My wife and I had to immediately rip off all of our clothing," said Chaim Neked, 61, a Hasidic grand father who lives here, "everyone I know disrobed immediately upon hearing the news. We are too religious to have even a strand of treif clothing in our possession."
The stripping, which is normally prohibited by Jewish law, was required in this emergency instance even in public places after rumors were confirmed that a Hasidic Shatnez laboratory had been giving phony shatnez free certifications to thousands of Orthodox Jewish families.
While some Chasidic men and women simply stripped down to their knickers, the more devout Chasidim bared it all and filled the streets completely naked calling for the immediate disciplining of the laboratory's owners.
Hundreds of other buck naked rabbis and scantily clad pale-skinned students gathered in nearby yeshivot and synagogues around the area for an immediate prayer for repentance and mikvah dipping.
It was the first completely naked prayer session recorded in history of upstate New York since Woodstock.