What do I get my Jewish friends for hanukkah?
We have a small office and every year i like to give christmas cards & small presents (usually some kind of candy or ornament) before christmas. I never know what to do for my 2 jewish friends that work here. Any suggestions? I don't want them to feel left out or insulted. Just that I care about them, & I know that they Hanukkah around the same time as christmas. Any suggestions?
What is the earliest date Hanukkah can start on?
Earliest date for the first night of Hanukkah is November 28, the latest possible date for the first night of Hanukkah is December 26.
Do I send a Hanukah, Hannukah, Chanukah card, or not??
Dear Morongrlll - It is a simple greeting card. Not a political or religious statement. If you are NOT Jewish and celebrating Hanukkah, NOT Christian and celebrating Christmas..then perhaps you don't quite 'get' that sending someone a card to wish them well on the religious holiday they celebrate is meant as a happy greeting, not as an acknowledgement that their religion is "okay", not as an accessory like a watch, or whatever else it is you went rambling on and on about. And in answer to your final question...yes. When compared with the 20 page over-analysis you just babbled on and on about, I would prefer a 5 word answer without further explanation. But thanks for the input. MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY HANUKKAH TO YOU AND YOURS!!
Is Hanukkah a fake holiday made by jealous Jews ?
Hanukkah predates Jesus by 165 years. Perhaps Christmas was made up by jealous Christians.
Why don't Christians celebrate Hanukkah and Passover?
Every Christian knows the story of Passover. I even learned about it in my History of the Bible class last year. (I go to a Catholic school where we take a religion course every year.) We also know the basics of Hanukkah - although most don't know much about the Maccabees. I brought some dreidels to school and taught my friends how to play when someone made the sarcastic comment "I'm such a good Christian." I laughed and pointed out that there's nothing anti-Christian about playing dreidel. Just tonight, I looked up (using three different Bibles and the Internet) Jewish holidays in the Bible. Hanukkah is mentioned, but not given a background, in the New Testament. The common version of the story is in the Catholic canon and certain versions of Protestant Bibles. The First and Second Books of the Maccabees, where the early versions of the story are found, aren't even included in the Tanakh. Wasn't Jesus a Jew? Isn't Christianity almost a continuation of Judaism? So why don't we celebrate Jewish holidays such as Hanukkah and Passover? I'm not arguing religion. It's just something I've always wondered, having gone to a Jewish community school when I was little, being raised Protestant, and now attending a Catholic high school.
When is the best time to wish Happy Hanukkah?
At the time of Hanukkah, which is different every year. It's appropriate to use the greeting during the entire eight-day course of the holiday.I am not offended at Merry Christmas wishes in December. I fully understand that Jews are a minority in the US, and Christianity is a de-facto state religion. I always wish Happy Holidays to people I don't know because I can never be sure of their religious or cultural affiliations. I met a deeply devout Christian guy in college who belonged to a church that did not celebrate Christmas on the grounds that it was not a festivity commanded in the scripture. He did observe Passover, however.The whole effort of making Hanukkah into J-Christmas is getting a bit much. I saw a fully lit hanukkiya in front if the Christmas tree on the 20th of December in NYC. It shouldn't be there, Hanukkah has been over for three weeks! It's ok to recognize that Christmas is not everyone's tradition. Jews don't feel short changed or left out. The extra effort around Christmas to include the Jewish populace into the celebration may actually make some feel that the majority still considers us inferior.
If Jesus was a Jew, why don’t Christians celebrate Hanukkah and other Jewish holidays?
Because very early in the formation of Christianity, Christians were considered a Jewish sect. As such, they were required (along with all other Jews) to pay a tax -called Fiscus Judaicus (“Jewish tax”) - imposed by the Roman Empire as payment for its conquest of the Province of Judaea (never mind that emperor Vespasian financed the Coliseum with the gold looted from Jerusalem).In 96AD, the Roman emperor Nerva relaxed the rules of Fiscus Judaicus so as to limit it to “practicing” Jews. The “Jewish Christians” successfully petitioned the emperor for an exemption on the basis that they were not practicing Jews, and sometime thereafter became completely separate from Jews.Christianity has sought to distance itself from Jews ever since. By and large, Christian writers through the centuries have sought to downplay - or completely conceal - Jesus’ Jewish identity, going so far as to invent numerous blood libels to demonize Jews; the most destructive of those was the “deicide”, the false claim that the Jews killed Jesus. That claim was renounced by the Catholic Church only in 1965, and the United Church of Canada still financially supports an organization (Sabeel) whose leader explicitly levelled this accusation at Israel in 2001.What surprises me is that none of the Christian writers, not even those charged with editing the Gospels, sought to edit or erase Mark 12:29. When asked which is the most important commandment,“The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.This is none other than the Shma Yisrael — the core expression of Jewishness :(שמע ישראל, יי אלוהינו, יי אחד)It may not seem like it now but at one time, Christians were a small startup sect. In their eagerness to build their numbers, they adopted pagan festivals as their own, or at least timed their own festivals to coincide with pagan ones (e.g. aligning Christmas with the winter solstice). There would have been no point in trying to adopt Jewish festivals because they weren’t likely to gain many converts to Christianity that way.
Why do people still celebrate Thanksgiving?
Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday and it's partially because it is so inclusive.Let's explain why:It's secular. People from every walk of life can celebrate it whether you're Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim. You're not asked to subscribe to any religious beliefs.It's not nationalistic. There is nothing intrinsically American about it. Canada celebrates it. You can be a just a visitor from another country and celebrate it at a friend's house. You won't feel uncomfortable. Currently 1 in 6 British families now celebrate in the UK.The basic message is unobjectionable: giving thanks for the good things that have happened in the past year. Whether it's been a difficult year or a good year, it's important to remember the good things that have happened.The original story is relatively simple and fairly true: two different people coming together with indigenous people helping feed the immigrants. It's a good time to contemplate the people of European's descent subsequent treatment of Native Americans.The basic celebration is around a meal. The exact details of meal aren't that important. It's generally focused around fall/harvest foods such as winter greens, root vegetables. If you're vegetarian you can have a perfect Thanksgiving. If you eat poultry, a Turkey is great. You can make a kosher Thanksgiving pretty easily.It's not particularly materialistic. You aren't expected to give gifts or buy much beyond food for a meal. There is not much pre-Thanksgiving day stress (other than travel)You're expected to cook yourself and not order in. This is important in our busy time when fewer and fewer people cook for themselves. It promotes using fresh ingredients.It's a good time to travel to family. It's not like other long-holidays where people just sit around and treat it like a long weekend. It's a special day.The primary complaint is that Christmas is eating Thanksgiving. You can argue that Thanksgiving promotes gluttony, and I don't have much to say about that. Food can be wasted, though not as much food is wasted as you might think since most people enjoy their Thanksgiving leftovers for the rest of the week.
Why can't Google say "Merry Christmas" during the holiday season?
It can. It chooses not to, probably for the same reason that lots of companies choose not to: because lots of people celebrate other holidays at that time of year. After all, Christmas was set to that time of year specifically to compete with the older Sol Invictus festival, which was chosen to coincide with the solstice. It's a pretty popular time of celebration across religions and cultures.
As a Jewish person, what do you think of the term 'Christmuskkah'?
It doesn’t bother me very much. But I do find other people’s reactions of to be quite amusing. Especially Marc Lipshitz who seems to be disgusted at such a notion, despite almost everything about the way people celebrate about Hanukkah is already non Jewish in origin. Here is a list of just a few of those things:Spinning of a dreidel: This is European in origin. It comes from the Teetotum.The giving of gifts during Hanukkah: Custom of the gentiles who give gifts during Christmas. In Arab lands this custom never took place amongst Mizrachi Jews as Christmas didn’t have the same prevalence there.Hanukah Gelt: Also Not Jewish: “Rabbi Deborah Prinz writes that “opinions differ” concerning the origins of chocolate gelt: Some credit America’s Loft candy company with creating it in the 1920s, while others suggest there were European versions earlier that inspired Israel’s Elite candy company. Prinz notes, as well, that chocolate gelt resembles a European Christmas tradition of exchanging gold-covered chocolate coins “commemorating the miracles of St. Nicholas.”So are all of those things now disgusting as well?