How to Lose the Chip on Your Shoulder During Christmas

We Jews have two choices in our approach to the Christmas season: resent it, or embrace it. I for one vote for a big, sloppy embrace. In the name of love thy neighbor and tolerance, I say we hug it out with Christmas already and teach our kids to do the same.

Why? We expect our non-Jewish co-workers, friends, and neighbors to show heaps of interest and concern in all things Jewish. During the High Holy Days we ask our kids’ teachers not to assign big tests after those long days at shul. We offer unsolicited explanations about why Hanukkah is not, despite unfortunate evidence to the contrary, the most important event on our calendar. For the week of Passover we bore everyone we know with the reasons we’re eating matzah and other weird stuff. (Yes, gentile co-worker, that “Kosher for Passover” salad dressing seems over the top to me, too.)

Tolerance is a two-way street. It would be chutzpadik and a bad example to our kids not to muster up some genuine interest in a holiday celebrated by a significant majority of our fellow citizens. So with that being said…

10 Steps to Lose the Attitude at Christmas

1. Stop lecturing everyone who says Merry Christmas. “Merry Christmas” doesn’t mean, “We want to convert you.” It doesn’t mean, “The Cossacks are coming so pack up the chickens.” More than anything it tends to replace, “Have a nice day.” Realistically, it also conveys, “I’ve been working this shift for nine hours, and I could not care less what holiday you celebrate or don’t.”

2. Eat peppermint bark. It’s chocolatey. It’s minty. It’s joy.

3. Get yourself invited to a Christmas party. Growing up in a heavily Jewish-populated suburb of Chicago, I was unaware of the Christmas happenings sprinkled throughout the month. Now that I’m raising my family in a neighborhood where we are among the few Jews, I love that we get invited to Christmas teas, tree-decorating parties, open houses, cocktail parties, and more. Show that you’re open to experiencing someone else’s traditions. It works both ways. I, for one, feel personally responsible for exposing many of my neighbors to Sukkot, or as they affectionately call it, “the holiday when you put that big fort in your yard.”

4. Appreciate Christmas break. They aren’t canceling school and days of work for Hanukkah and Kwanza, y’all.

5. Participate in the Jewiest Christmas tradition of all–The Cookie Exchange. If you’re not aware of the frenetic cookie baking and eating that happens during the month of December, then you’re missing out. Get thee to a cookie exchange pronto. We’re talking infinite varieties of cookies and an atmosphere subtly laced with the taste of competition. This is a tradition that speaks our language.

Continue reading.

Beating the Blues: How to Handle Holiday Stress and Depression

We’re in the midst of the holiday season, which can be a time of great joy. But, for some, it can also bring on higher amounts of stress and anxiety and depression. Experiencing the “holiday blues” isn’t uncommon, but it doesn’t have to ruin your December. Here are some tips and tricks for beating the blues and enjoying the holidays!

Find the root cause of your depression

One of the most important things you can do if you’re feeling sad is sit down and try to pinpoint what is causing the feeling.

Did you lose someone you were close to this year? Do the holidays make you feel anxious about what the next year will bring? Do you feel like you aren’t invited to enough holiday events? Do you feel like you’ve got too many events?

All of these issues and feelings may be heightened during this time. If you can figure out what is causing your depression and it’s situational, you can take steps to fix it.

Eat right 

If you’re dieting, the holidays can be a minefield of extravagant meals and temptations of extra desserts. Following a strict diet can be difficult during this time of year, and if you slip up, it can cause you to become depressed. Combat this by coming up with a plan ahead of time. If you’re going to a holiday party, eat healthier for the rest of the day. Remind yourself that one cookie is not going to derail your entire diet, and enjoy things in moderation.

Continue reading.

Has This Product Solved The December Dilemma?

Let me set the scene. David Levy, Managing Editor of JewishBoston.com, declared:

If Manischewitz can market Chanukah gingerbread houses, I declare the “December Dilemma” officially solved.

What do you think? Will this kit, complete with white and blue icing and decorations, solve your gingerbread house needs? Would you make one with your family? Would your in-laws approve?

Just between you and me, I kinda love it. And maybe wanted to buy it a few months back when I first saw it in stores. And, because I’m a bit of a Jewish nerd, I love that the kit includes a mezuzah to affix to the vanilla cookie home’s doorway.

And, for the next day or so, JoyOfKosher.com is giving away a kit to one lucky winner. Enter now!

Dreidels

TEST-DRIVING dreidels at the Jewish Museum Shop on the Upper East Side, David Alhadeff, 38, turned into a child again. A look of pure glee crossed his face whenever he got a particularly good “spinner,” as he put it.

Never mind the unsolicited comments from the shoppers who gathered around him.

“You only get five tries,” one older gentleman told Mr. Alhadeff, the owner of the Future Perfect stores in Manhattan and Brooklyn, while watching the action (or lack thereof) with one particular model.

And a woman visiting from Napa, Calif., advised: “The cheap wood ones are the best.”

Mr. Alhadeff was inclined to agree. The wooden ones were the kind he played with as a child at the Seattle Hebrew Academy, but he claims that his hand-eye coordination is much better now. “The gleam you see in my eyes today is because I actually got these things spinning,” he said.

Buoyed by his success, Mr. Alhadeff went in search of more modern dreidels, but was surprised to find that, unlike the wide selection of modern menorahs, the modern dreidel pickings were slim. His theory: “It’s because it’s a kids’ game. It’s a piece of nostalgia for an adult to receive a dreidel, whereas receiving a nice menorah is receiving a relevant Judaica gift that you will use.”

Jonathan Adler was one of the few designers who offered several options. “He’s a great designer and a Jew, so it makes sense he not only did a dreidel, but did it from a modern perspective,” Mr. Alhadeff said. “They’re cute, fun and fit into the new modern lifestyle.”

Continue reading.  

Hanukkah Gifts: A history of the practice and some tips for parents

Most American Jews can rattle off a list of Hanukkah traditions such as lighting the menorah each night; playing dreidel games; eating foods cooked in oil; and giving gifts. However, many wonder if this last tradition is really a Jewish tradition, or whether Hanukkah presents just came about in reaction to Christmas.
A Brief History

Jonathan Sarna, professor of American Jewish history at Brandeis University, explains that Jews used to exchange gifts only on Purim, but in the late 19th century there was a shift from Purim to Hanukkah. Christmas itself became magnified in the late 19th century when it became a national holiday in America. The Jewish custom shifted in imitation of Christmas, as its consumerism grew.shop our hanukkah store

Sarna distinguishes the practice of giving Hanukkah gifts from its precursor--Hanukkah gelt (Yiddish for money): "Hanukkah gelt is an old custom, well attested in Europe. Gift giving, by contrast, is new.?

The precise origin of Hanukkah gelt is unclear. The most popular explanation is that coins became a symbol of the holiday because the ancient Jews' ability to make their own coins was a symbol of the independence they gained in the battles that the festival of lights commemorates.

In his book Holidays, History and Halakhah, Eliezer Segal argues that the earliest sources that mention gelt on Hanukkah are about students in Europe giving gelt to their teachers. Segal suggests that this practice was perhaps inspired by semantic and etymological connections between the Hebrew word Hanukkah (dedication) and the Hebrew word hinnukh (education).

According to Segal, some Jewish communities used the Hanukkah season to recognize religious teachers who, because of the prohibition of accepting money for teaching Torah, would normally not accept payment for their work. Segal suggests that students whose parents gave them money to pass on to their teachers eventually started to ask for their own share of gelt. This might be the source of the custom to give gelt to children on Hanukkah.


Contemporary Parents

Continue reading.

Hanukkah, A Short History

Hanukkah, the "Festival of Lights," starts on the 25th day of the Jewish calendar month of Kislev and lasts for eight days and nights. In 2012, Hanukkah begins at sundown on December 8. With blessings, games, and festive foods, Hanukkah celebrates the triumphs--both religious and military--of ancient Jewish heroes.

Hanukkah is a relatively minor holiday in the Jewish year. In the United States, however, its closeness to Christmas has brought greater attention to Hanukkah and its gift-giving tradition. Amid the ever-growing flood of Christmas advertising, it may seem especially fitting that the Hanukkah story tells of Jewish culture surviving in a non-Jewish world.
The Hanukkah Story

Nearly 2,200 years ago, the Greek-Syrian ruler Antiochus IV tried to force Greek culture upon peoples in his territory. Jews in Judea - now Israel- were forbidden their most important religious practices as well as study of the Torah. Although vastly outnumbered, religious Jews in the region took up arms to protect their community and their religion. Led by Mattathias the Hasmonean, and later his son Judah the Maccabee, the rebel armies became known as the Maccabees.

After three years of fighting, in the year 3597, or about 165 B.C.E., the Maccabees victoriously reclaimed the temple on Jerusalem's Mount Moriah. Next they prepared the temple for rededication -- in Hebrew, Hanukkah means "dedication." In the temple they found only enough purified oil to kindle the temple light for a single day. But miraculously, the light continued to burn for eight days.


Read more

Eight Nights of Chanukah: A Spiritual Perspective

Gifts and gadgets, latkes and dreidels are only part of the Chanukah story. Indeed, the eight nights of Chanukah provide eight opportunities to learn and think about Jewish values while taking in the glow of the dancing Chanukah lights.

Let Inner Goodness Shine - Eight Nights of Important Values.

Each value begs for discussion.

1. What does Jewish tradition have to say about these values?

2. How has Jewish history shaped the way Jews relate to these values? 

3.  Why are these values important?

4. How do we express the values in our day to day lives?

5.  In an ideal world, how would we work to change the world to better reflect these goals?

6. How can we include this idealized version into our busy lives today?

7. Who do you know that personifies each of these values?

8. What has happened to you to show you the importance of these values?

Additional Spiritual Spins:

Continue reading.

Guess What's Coming?

 Hanukkah begins in the evening of Saturday, December 8, 2012, and ends in the evening of Sunday, December 16, 2012.

Minor Fast Days

Without any holidays this month this seemed like a good time to focus on some lesser well known Jewish commemorations, the Ta'anit Tsibor, the minor fast days.

There are five minor fasts on the Jewish calendar. With one exception, these fasts were instituted by the Sages to commemorate some national tragedy. The minor fasts (that is, all fasts except Yom Kippur and Tisha b'Av) last from dawn (first light) to nightfall (full dark), and one is permitted to eat breakfast if one arises before dawn for the purpose of doing so (but you must finish eating before first light). There is a great deal of leniency in the minor fasts for people who have medical conditions or other difficulties fasting. The date of the fast is moved to Sunday if the specified date falls on Shabbat.

Three of these five fasts commemorate events leading to the downfall of the first commonwealth and the destruction of the first Temple, which is commemorated by the major fast of Tisha B'Av.

Following is a list of minor fasts required by Jewish law, their dates, and the events they commemorate:

The Fast of Gedaliah, Tishri 3, commemorates the killing of the Jewish governor of Judah, a critical event in the downfall of the first commonwealth.

The Fast of Tevet, Tevet 10, is the beginning of the siege of Jerusalem. It has also been proclaimed a memorial day for the six million Jews who died in the Holocaust.

The Fast of Esther, Adar 13, commemorates the three days that Esther fasted before approaching King Ahasuerus on behalf of the Jewish people. The fast is connected with Purim. If Adar 13 falls on a Friday or Saturday, it is moved to the preceding Thursday, because it cannot be moved forward a day (it would fall on Purim).

The Fast of the Firstborn, Nissan 14, is a fast observed only by firstborn males, commemorating the fact that they were saved from the plague of the firstborn in Egypt. It is observed on the day preceding Passover.

The Fast of Tammuz, Tammuz 17, is the date when the walls of Jerusalem were breached, another major event leading up to the destruction of the First Temple. 

• A few minor fasts last only from sunrise to sunset
• It is permissible to wake early in the morning and eat before the fast starts

Months of the Jewish Year

The months of the Jewish year are lunar in nature. Unlike the months of the Gregorian solar year that is the norm in the world today, the months of the Jewish year reflect the phases of the moon. This can be seen most clearly in the length of the months. Whereas the months of the Gregorian calendar vary in length between twenty-eight and thirty-one days in order to make a solar year of 365 (or, in leap years, 366) days, the months of the Jewish year are either twenty-nine or thirty days long. This reflects the fact that a lunar month is twenty-nine and a half days in length, and the months always must begin with the new moon.

A year of twelve lunar months, however, is some eleven days shorter than a solar year. In order to ensure that the various seasonally based holidays in the Jewish calendar continue to occur at the correct season, the rabbis developed a system over time that allowed them to coordinate their lunar months with the solar year by inserting a leap month at the end of the year seven times in every 19-year cycle. This is now fixed in the third, sixth, eighth, 11th, 14th, 17th, and 19th years of the cycle. Although this is traditionally ascribed to Rabbi Hillel II in the fourth century CE, it is probable that the system in use today developed slowly during the course of the mid to late first millennium.

In order to further fine-tune their calculations, the rabbis determined that the months of Nisan (March-April), Sivan (May-June), Av (July-August), Tishrei (September-October), and Shevat (January-February) are always thirty days long. Iyyar (April-May), Tammuz (June-July), Elul (August-September), Tevet (December-January), and Adar (March-April) are always twenty-nine days long. Heshvan (October-November) and Kislev (November-December) are either twenty-nine or thirty days in length. In a leap year, there are two months of Adar, the last month of the year. When that occurs, Adar I is thirty days long, and Adar II twenty-nine. A short Jewish year, therefore, consists of 353 to 355 days, while a leap year varies between 383 and 385 days.

Continue reading.

Marcheshvan The Bitter Month

Cheshvan, the month following Tishrei on the modern Jewish calendar is referred to in the Tanach as Yerach Bul (Kings I, Chapter 6:38). Bul refers to the idea that during this month the grass withers (baleh) and feed is mixed (bolelin) in the house for the animals (Rashi’s interpretation). Others think it may come from the word yevul (produce) for during this month plowing and planting begin in Israel. Still others see a reference toMabul, flood, since according to the Midrash more rain falls in this month since it marks the beginning of the great Flood during the time of Noach.

In modern times, this month has become known as Cheshvan or Mar Cheshvan, which seems to have originated at the time that Jews came back to Israel after the Babylonian Exile. The prefix Mar (which means bitter) is a reference to this month having no festivals or rejoicing, but much suffering for Jews throughout the ages. Also during this month, God brought down the Flood and drowned the world (except for Noach and those with him on the ark.) Mar also means drop and refers to the first rains (theYoreh), which fall in Cheshvan.

Ritual Practices: Cheshvan always has a two-day Rosh Chodesh, the second of which, the first of the new month, always falls on a Monday, Wednesday, Thursday or Shabbat. 

On the seventh day of Cheshvan those living in Israel begin requesting rain by adding "Veten Tal U'Matar" to their Shmone Esre prayers. If no rain has fallen by the 17th, a drought is feared and ritual fasting and special prayer begins.   

Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah

...On the fifteenth day of this seventh month is the Festival of Sukkot, seven days for the L-RD... on the eighth day, there shall be a holy convocation for you. -Leviticus 23:34

Tishri 22, the day after the seventh day of Sukkot, is the holiday Shemini Atzeret. In Israel, Shemini Atzeret is also the holiday of Simchat Torah. Outside of Israel, where extra days of holidays are held, only the second day of Shemini Atzeret is Simchat Torah: Shemini Atzeret is Tishri 22 and 23, while Simchat Torah is Tishri 23.

These two holidays are commonly thought of as part of Sukkot, but that is technically incorrect; Shemini Atzeret is a holiday in its own right and does not involve some of the special observances of Sukkot. We do not take up the lulav and etrog on these days, and our dwelling in the sukkah is more limited, and performed without reciting a blessing.

Shemini Atzeret literally means "the assembly of the eighth (day)." Rabbinic literature explains the holiday this way: our Creator is like a host, who invites us as visitors for a limited time, but when the time comes for us to leave, He has enjoyed himself so much that He asks us to stay another day. Another related explanation: Sukkot is a holiday intended for all of mankind, but when Sukkot is over, the Creator invites the Jewish people to stay for an extra day, for a more intimate celebration.

Simchat Torah means "Rejoicing in the Torah." This holiday marks the completion of the annual cycle of weekly Torah readings. Each week in synagogue we publicly read a few chapters from the Torah, starting with Genesis Ch. 1 and working our way around to Deuteronomy 34. On Simchat Torah, we read the last Torah portion, then proceed immediately to the first chapter of Genesis, reminding us that the Torah is a circle, and never ends.

Continue reading.

Sukkot

...On the fifteenth day of this seventh month is the Festival of Sukkot, seven days for the L-RD. -Leviticus 23:34

The Festival of Sukkot begins on Tishri 15, the fifth day after Yom Kippur. It is quite a drastic transition, from one of the most solemn holidays in our year to one of the most joyous. Sukkot is so unreservedly joyful that it is commonly referred to in Jewish prayer and literature as Z'man Simchateinu, the Season of our Rejoicing.

Sukkot is the last of the Shalosh R'galim (three pilgrimage festivals). Like Passover and Shavu'ot, Sukkot has a dual significance: historical and agricultural. Historically, Sukkot commemorates the forty-year period during which the children of Israel were wandering in the desert, living in temporary shelters. Agriculturally, Sukkot is a harvest festival and is sometimes referred to as Chag Ha-Asif , the Festival of Ingathering.

The word "Sukkot" means "booths," and refers to the temporary dwellings that we are commanded to live in during this holiday in memory of the period of wandering. The Hebrew pronunciation of Sukkot is "Sue COAT," but is often pronounced as in Yiddish, to rhyme with "BOOK us." The name of the holiday is frequently translated "Feast of Tabernacles," which, like many translations of Jewish terms, isn't very useful. This translation is particularly misleading, because the word "tabernacle" in the Bible refers to the portable Sanctuary in the desert, a precursor to the Temple, called in Hebrew "mishkan." The Hebrew word "sukkah" (plural: "sukkot") refers to the temporary booths that people lived in, not to the Tabernacle.

Sukkot lasts for seven days. The two days following the festival, Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah, are separate holidays but are related to Sukkot and are commonly thought of as part of Sukkot.

The festival of Sukkot is instituted in Leviticus 23:33 et seq. No work is permitted on the first and second days of the holiday. (See Extra Day of Holidays for an explanation of why the Bible says one day but we observe two). Work is permitted on the remaining days. These intermediate days on which work is permitted are referred to as Chol Ha-Mo'ed, as are the intermediate days of Passover.

 

 Continue reading on how to build a sukkah and the meaning of the Arba Minim/The Four Spices.

Watch this video on "What is a Sukkah?"