The American holiday of Thanksgiving is nigh.
With it is the annual debate among some "orthodox" Jews - what to do on that day.
Why celebrate the day?
Thanksgiving in the U.S. - Canada celebrates a similar day on the second Monday in October - is one of several NATIONAL holidays that are free of religious images. The others include Fourth of July, Flag day, Memorial and Labor days, and Presidents' Day.
Thanksgiving is a time Americans, as a nation, give thanks for their freedoms.
There is no other nation in the world that has been as good to the Jews. None. This is not to denigrate the likes of Australia, Canada, China, and Japan, the last for providing a resting place for Jews fleeing the nazis, nor is it to overlook the insults and injuries Jews have suffered here from time to time, nor does it ignore the latent and blatent anti-semitism lingering in some people.
But today, to its credit, in the United States a Jew is "just another citizen." To me, that is about as good as it gets.
I am a hyphenated citizen, American-Israeli, born and raised in the United States.My parents were born here. My wife likewise is a hyphenated citizen, Israeli-American.
We appreciate the freedoms the U.S. offers. We appreciate the relative safety - while the crime rate in our area is far too high, we don't have to run to shelters when our nbeighbors in Cuba, Mexico, or Canada fire missiles at us. Here we can, and do, vote for specific individuals for public office - and turn them out, peacefully, if they fail us.
When our children were living at home we celebrated a kosher Thanksgiving with the "traditional" turkey dinner (and we kept on celebrating until all the leftovers disappeared some days later).
It was a day we could invite non-Jewish friends to dine with us in a more or less "formal" setting, friends we could not invite for a Passover seders*, our other "major formal meal" of the year. (By comparison, Fourth of July usually was an informal bar-be-que.)
*שמות כ"א מ"ג: זות החקת הפסח כל-בן-נכר לא יוכל בו
For a Jew, we offer "thanksgiving" every day when we read/recite Hodu (actually two or three times - the third in the Moroccan tradition) in the prayer that officially starts the morning service.
הודו ל'' קראו בשמו . . .
הודו ל'' כי טוב כי לעולם חסדו במורוקו: הודו ל'' כי טוב כי לעולם חסדו - ב" פעמים
"Orthodox" Jews who want to celebrate Thanksgiving with turkey and all the trimmings have two "godolim b'dor" to cite to back them up in their desire.
According to Rabbi Moshe Feinstein in four published responsa [rabbinic rulings] on the issues related to celebrating Thanksgiving, all conclude that Thanksgiving is not a religious holiday but a secular one.
Rabbi Feinstein reinforces his understanding that Thanksgiving is not a religious holiday in a responsum published in 1980. He states: "On the issue of joining with those who think that Thanksgiving is like a holiday to eat a meal: Since it is clear that according to their religious law books this day is not mentioned as a religious holiday and that one is not obligated in a meal [according to Gentile religious law] and since this is a day of remembrance to citizens of this country, when they came to reside here either now or earlier, halakhah [Jewish law] sees no prohibition in celebrating with a meal or with the eating of turkey. One sees similar to this in Kiddushin 66 that Yanai the king made a party after the conquest of kochlet in the desert and they ate vegetables as a remembrance.
Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik also agreed that Thanksgiving was not a Gentile holiday, and ruled that it was permissible to eat turkey on Thanksgiving. Rabbi Hershel Schachter, in his intellectual biography of Rabbi Soloveitchik, Nefesh HaRav, writes:
"It was the opinion of Rabbi Soloveitchik that it was permissible to eat turkey at the end of November, on the day of Thanksgiving. We understood that, in his opinion, there was no question that turkey did not lack a tradition of kashrut and that eating it on Thanksgiving was not a problem of imitating gentile customs. We also heard that this was the opinion of his father, Rabbi Moshe Soloveitchik."
(More on the subject at http://yohanon.blogspot.com/2009/11/thanksgiving.html)
Acknowledge
There are those who "acknowledge" the day by eating "mac-n-cheese" or otherwise abstaining from meat.
In a sense that, too, is a "celebration," albeit one that tells everyone who is aware of Jewish customs that the celebration isn't rally one of happiness. Jews, unless they normally abstain from meat, consider a meal sans meat and wine a non-celebatory meal.
The "acknowledgement" is that Thanksgiving is a national holiday, but that by foregoing the "traditional" meal they separate themselves from the rest of the American community.
Ignore the "non-Jewish" holiday
Those who ignore the holiday tell their neighbors their loyalties are elsewere; they are not, nor do they really want to be, "Americans."
They make an effort to ignore the fact that they are protected by Americans, that they have freedoms not found in Europe or South America or most of the Middle East; essentially I feel they "thumb their noses" at the country that provides them sanctuary.
"If it's not a Jewish holiday then we won't celebrate it."
Some of these people also ignore Israeli holidays, but then they are in the U.S., not Israel.
Unfortunately, these people cause non-Jewish Americans to question the majority of Jews' loyalty to the country in which they live. They do us no favors.
As for me
As for my wife and me, we will honor the holiday, but this year not with a big bird - there will be, this Thanksgiving, only two at the table. I don't know what we will do that will be "special," but I'm certain we'll come up with something.
הריני מקבל עלי מצוה עשה של ואהבת לרעך כמוך, והריני אוהב כל אחד מבני ישראל כנפשי ומאודי
