Sermon in Song

Rabbi Joel Fleekop

Friday, December 22, 2006

This is part 2 of a two-part presentation on the Revival of Hanukah in the 20th Century. Read part 1, Zionism and Hanukah, by Rabbi Melanie Aron.

For those who lived in America 150 years ago, the type of Hanukkah celebrations that we have today would have been impossible to imagine for two reasons.

First, there already existed a holiday on which Jews exchanged gifts, played games to entertain children, and produced plays that told stories of great courage and heroism. That holiday, of course was Purim, which for Eastern European Jews was the primary time of merrymaking and unrestrained fun.

The second and perhaps most important reason why it would have been impossible to imagine a celebration in December like the modern Hanukkah is because there did not exist a celebration in December like the modern Christmas.

In 1659 Massachusettes made the celebration of Christmas, through the avoidance of work or feasting, an offense punishable by a five shilling fine. While the law was later repealed, celebrations of Christmas remained relatively minor throughout the first half of the 19th century. It was not until great waves of German immigrants arrived in the 1840s and 1850s, bringing with them to America their traditions of Saint Nicholas and Christmas trees, that the nation showed much interest in Christmas. Only after the Civil War did tree ornaments and elaborate department stores displays gain popularity in America in America. The first Christmas card did not appear until 1874.

Throughout the antebellum period and the years immediately following the Civil War, American-Jews marked Hanukkah much the same way they marked other Jewish holidays; with a level of dignity and decorum on par with what existed in their neighbor’s Protestant Churches and with a celebration of Judaism’s values, values they saw as congruous with those of the Enlightenment. The Charleston, South Carolina Native and preeminent Jewish poetess of the 1830s and 1840s, Penina Moshe expresses these ideals in her hymn, Great Arbiter of Human Fate.

While the early American Christmas was an understated, religious occasion, the approach of the 20th century brought dramatic change. By the late 1880s Christmas had become the premier American Holiday, aided by the myth of a gift giving Santa Clause, and extravagant retail displays. In 1897 the New York Tribune, somewhat critically, described the “modern Christmas” as “a time for barter, for display, for acquisitiveness.”

The development of the “modern Christmas” had an affect not only on Christian America but also the rapidly growing Jewish community. With Christmas stripped of its religious meaning and serving primarily as a celebration of consumption, both Reform Jews of German stock and recently arrived Eastern European Jews embraced the holiday and its symbols. Christmas trees appeared in Jewish homes and it became common place for Jews to give and accept Christmas presents. As the Forward explained, Jews saw this behavior not as an embrace of Christianity but as a sign that they were Americanizing.

Some, like Rabbi Judah Magnes of New York’s Temple Emanu-El responded to the “challenge” of Christmas by condemning those who would bring a tree into their home. Others, like a writer at the Yiddish periodical Tageblatt, suggested that Jews find spiritual meaning in the excesses of the gentile Christmas, arguing that “the ancient struggle of the Jews against the turbulent forces of Antiochus found no better parallel than the struggle between the poor, quiet, little Chanukah lights and the brightly illuminated, dressed-up and decorated Christmas Tree.” Most, however, dealt with the challenge of Christmas by simply elevating and recreating the nearly forgotten holiday of Hanukah.

Hoping to create interest in Hanukkah, Rabbi Emil Hirsch stressed in an article written for the Ladies Home Journal at the beginning of the 20th century that like Christmas, Hanukkah offered “a vigorous story, dramatic incidents, strong personalities, fine home-scenes, abundance of imagery, plenty of traditional customs, and home cheer.”

The drama and heroic nature of Hanukkah are extolled in Rufus Learsi’s song “Hail the Maccabees” arranged by Samuel and Israel Goldfarb.

Compelling as the story of the Maccabees may be, in 1925 the Morgen Zhurnal warned, “Recounting the heroic exploits of the Maccabbees is not enough. To command the attention and affection of Jewish children, the holiday must become an occasion for storytelling, gift-giving, and merrymaking.”

With the custom of Hanukkah gelt as its foundation, by the 1940s gift giving became an integral part of the American Hanukkah. Expressing a popular sentiment, a 1950s guide to Jewish living explained that, “Jewish children should be showered with gifts, Hanukkah gifts, as a perhaps primitive but most effective means of making them immune against envy of the Christian children and their Christmas presents.”

The giving of gifts, combined with the presence of beautiful menorahs and other Hanukkah decorations not only created a sort of equality between Christmas and Hanukkah but served to push the celebration of Hanukkah further into the sphere of children. A reality expressed in the Goldfarb song “I Have a Little Dreidel.”

As we begin the 21st century, those who grew up with the fully consumerized Hanukkah have added new meaning to the holiday. For them the celebration of Hanukkah is a sign of their unique identity. And so not only do they light the menorah during Hanukkah, but on December 25th they gather together at events with names like the Latke Ball, the Matzah Ball, and Vodka Latke to be in community with others for whom Hanukkah is the only holiday celebrated in December. The sentiment that Hanukkah is not only about the Maccabbes but about being a part of a community that doesn’t celebrate Christmas is most famously expressed in Adam Sandler’s Hanukkah Song.