Conference taveng::bagels

    Growing up my dad was very religious and he kept us on the level.
    We kept a kosher home (Both my folks and  my wife and I still do)
    we went to shul every Sat morn rain or shine etc, etc..
    
      We always went out for halloween..... Oh I grew up in a 
    "Jewish neighborhood (Brookline, mass...)"
    
        jeff

    re: .1
    
    I believe you as far as your upbringing, etc. is concerned.  But
    were you aware that in celebrating Halloween, you were taking part
    in a Catholic holiday?
    
    I'm not trying to be hard line, but I spent a year in a Catholic
    prep school(Newman Prep), and Nov. 1 was a holiday.  In fact I remember
    Cardinal Cushing coming over on the 31st and giving students his
    blessing for all saint's day(of course I didn't participate in that,
    in fact I secretly gave him the finger!).
    
    David

    Re .1
    
    I grew up in a similar situation in a VERY Jewish neighborhood in
    the Bronx. As a child I got dressed for Halloween every year. If
    anyone is familiar with 170th Street in the Bronx you know that
    all the store owners there were Jewish. Even so the street was
    lined with christmas lights. I didn't know that there was any
    religious significance to these holidays until my teens. I guess
    the store owners were using the holiday, just like everyone else,
    to push their goods. 
    
    			Fred

    
>    I'm not trying to be hard line, but I spent a year in a Catholic
>    prep school(Newman Prep), and Nov. 1 was a holiday.  In fact I remember
>    Cardinal Cushing coming over on the 31st and giving students his
>    blessing for all saint's day(of course I didn't participate in that,
>    in fact I secretly gave him the finger!).
    
>    David



David,

	If you felt that uncomfortable being blessed by Cardinal Cushing
in a Catholic Prep school perhaps you should have chosen a secular school
instead.
	
	Giving him the finger, even secretly, is in rather poor taste ,
to say the least.


David

    Also, Halloween is not original with the Catholics--it's a
    much older pagan celebration.  The missionaries in Europe
    re-used the old holy sites and holy days (and recycled some
    of the old gods as saints, such as St. George).
    
    Christmas is built on a pagan mid-winter celebration,
    but the Christian overlay is much stronger.  Halloween has
    little to no such overlay.  Of course, if you feel the pagan
    overtones are too strong, and wish to avoid celebrating it,
    that's fine.
    
    I've though it interesting that of the four yearly festivals
    (solstices and equinoxes), the summer one is pretty much gone,
    while Easter, Halloween, and Christmas are still going strong.
    Perhaps this is because the mid-summer one is not significant
    in the agricultural cycle, while planting, harvesting and the
    promise of the end of winter are.
    
    			-John Bishop

    re: .5
    
    Practically all religious holidays were at one time pagan in origin.
    All they did was furnish a convenient "boilerplate" for the different
    religions.
    
    re: .4
    
    I didn't have much choice in going to Newman Prep, the thinking
    behind it was to give me a better preparation for college than I
    received in the Boston public schools.  What I did receive was a
    conditioning to tons of homework.
    
    Maybe giving the finger to Cardinal Cushing was distasteful, but
    he symbolized an institution that had either initiated or had tolerated
    violence against the Jewish people.
    
    There was an article in the Jerusalem Post magazine some years ago
    which discussed Halloween & the Jews.  I guess I am going to have
    to get in touch with them for a copy of it, and get back to you
    all afterwards.
    
    David 

    I think that the important thing is maintaining one's values in
    the world in which we live, which, needless to say, is not
    overpopulated with Jewish people.
    
    The giving of gifts in a holiday which occurs in December (it was
    mentioned somewhere that in olden days gift-giving was done during
    Purim) and letting our children dress up and get cavities once a
    year seems to me to be entirely benign. To get up in arms and engage
    in Talmudic hair-splitting because once Halloween was possibly more
    associated with religion than it is today (How many people think
    of Halloween as as religious holiday?) would only serve to make
    our kids feel different (negatively), left out from a LOT of fun,
    and alien toward Judaism.
    
    I think the important thing is to give our kids a positive self-image
    about being Jewish, whatever religious/cultural training is consistent
    with our own beliefs, and let them have a good time being kids.
    
    Dick Rosenberg
    

    If the same children who went "trick or Treating" on Halloween also
    dressed up on Purim and gave gifts (NOT an "olden days" custom but
    still practiced) then I wouldn't worry so much.  What is happening
    though, is that as we American Jews begin to accept "national,'non-
    religious' celebrations" many also diminish or forget to observe
    Jewish holidays and celebrations. The problem is that "our chlidren
    get dressed up and get cavities _once_ a year" [emphais mine] and
    that ONCE is the GENTILE/AMERICAN time. 
    
    <Flame on>
    My children do NOT go "Trick or Treating".  What are they missing?
    What "values in the world in which we live" are they learning to
    maintain by celebrating Halloween?
    Begging, Treif candy, throwing eggs at houses and cars, scaring people!
    
    They go to Jewish Day Schools; therefore, they don't carve pumpkins
    in school or have Halloween parties.
    What are they missing?  A chance to be artistic?  ...to be social?
    
    What they have done for the past few weeks is learn about Sukkot. 
    They have helped build our own Sukkah and spent time in school and 
    at home making decorations.Ours has colored lights, garlands, 
    hanging fruit, and uninvited raccoons.
    <Flame off>
    
    Let's realize that as we melt into the dominant culture, and our Purim
    becomes Halloween,our Sukkot becomes Thanksgiving, our minor holiday
    of Chanukah becomes the Jewish Xmas, our Passover becomes spring
    vacation, Shabbat becomes "old fashioned" and Shavouot is lost 
    completely (not to mention Tisha B'Av), we will have no way to
    actively transmit our values.  
    
    ---Av
    

    	In Succat service last week the Rabbi brought up the idea/concept
    that Succat & Halloween could be related. The idea of building a
    Succah and eating in it etc. the idea of inviting our the "fore
    fathers" and our deceased relatives to share a meal in the Succah.
    
    
    	Also the  Rabbi's in about 1500 AD decide that the realtionship
    between Halloween and any religious significance was so remote,
    that it was okay for the kids to do their thing on Halloween.

    
    Jerry
    

>>>< Note 214.9 by CHEAPR::WEINER "Jerry Weiner" >
>>>                              -< Halloween is OK >-
>>>
>>>    	In Succat service last week the Rabbi brought up the idea/concept
>>>    that Succat & Halloween could be related. The idea of building a
>>>    Succah and eating in it etc. the idea of inviting our the "fore
>>>    fathers" and our deceased relatives to share a meal in the Succah.

			hah??
>>>    
>>>    
>>>    	Also the  Rabbi's in about 1500 AD decide that the realtionship
>>>    between Halloween and any religious significance was so remote,
>>>    that it was okay for the kids to do their thing on Halloween.
    
			who?

/d feinberg

    It's hard for me to believe that as children the Bal Shem Tov,
    the Vilna Gaon, the Chofetz Chaim, and Rabbi Yisroel Salanter 
    (or [l'havdil] even Moses Mendelson) ran around scaring the 
    daylights out of their neighbors and toilet papering and egging
    houses. ;^}
    
    BTW-My mother, who was raised in Czestachowa, Poland remembers that
    Halloween was a night when her non-jewish neighbors tipped over
    gravestones in the Jewish Cemetery and wrote "love notes" on shuls
    and houses in the Jewish sections. 
    
    ---Av 

re:  .-1

I didn't mean to be totally "flip".

If there is such a responsa (i. e., "the Rabbis in the 1500's"), I'd
really like to see it or a citation to it.

/dlf

    Wow, now this note is generating the response that I expected it
    to!
    
    re: .11
    >BTW-My mother, who was raised in Czestachowa, Poland remembers
    >that Halloween was a night when her non-jewish neighbors tipped
    >over gravestones in the Jewish Cemetery and wrote "love notes"
    >on shuls and houses in the Jewish sections.
    
    I think the above response is what I was looking for.  For those
    of us who have European parents, particularly survivors, we tend
    to look at the gentile traditions in another light.  Yes, in North
    America, Halloween can seem like a harmless, "non-sectarian" holiday.
    But when you look at it in the broader world perspective, then it
    takes on a whole new aspect.
    
    I'd also like to know what Rabbis in the 1500's condoned the practice
    of Halloween for Jews.
    
    David

    "Love notes" on shuls is not restricted to Europe.  It is a rare
    year, indeed, that doesn't find a shaving cream swastika on my shul's
    doorway on the morning of Nov. 1st.
    
    I still see two issues here. 1) Halloween itself as a fitting 'holiday'
    for Jews to celebrate, and 2) the trend to celebrate 'national/non-
    sectarian' and once-non-Jewish-religiously-based-but-not-now-"religious
    holidays---usually at the expense of and diminution of Jewish holidays.
            
      ___Av

    If you find swastika's every year, how come you
    have not hired a security guard as we do on Long Island?

    Last year, our schul was broken into and they burned all the
    tallis and books in the center of the synagogue.   The torah's
    were not hurt though the covenant was scorched.  (It was caught
    in time by a custodian and put out quickly, but not before
    it gutted most of the insides).  A friend told me of this
    and I because furious.  He also told me that when they cleaned
    up the inside of the synagogue, on the podium floor, under where the
    fire had been burning the hottest, there was a Chi ('h) burned
    in the floor boards.  I didn't believe it until I saw the pictures.

    re .10
  

    re: Cardinal Cushing.  He was very liberal towards Jews - he should
    have been since his sister married one.  
    

    re: Cardinal Cushing(.17)
    
    Yes, I guess on an indivdual basis, he was liberal towards the Jews.
    He was always more or less a symbol of the institution for me. 
    It was hard to grow up in Boston and ignore him.
    
    David 

    re .several:
    
    I'll bet that a lot of us who aren't Jews don't stop to think that
    there are a******s who would vandalize shuls and burn scrolls. And
    then I was wondering about D. Cherson's attitude towards the Catholics
    (as an example).
    
    It's past for this year, but for future years, do y'all want some
    assistance keeping an eye on your shuls? If you'll pardon the pagan
    reference, I seem to recall that the Phoenicians had these beefy
    young men with clubs guarding their temples...
    
    Dick
    

    re:.18
    
    I don't have an "attitude" towards individual Catholics, far from
    it.  You should be able to separate the institution from the people.
    
    David
     

    Somehow, having a couple folks with clubs outside the door wouldn't
    help put me in the proper mood for the holidays.  Some shuls hire
    a rent-a-cop for the high holidays.  He may be the one who checks
    tickets.  He has a very boring job.
    
    In our shul he wouldn't even be able to check tickets - everyone
    shows up at the same time, between 5 minutes before and 10 minutes
    after the announced start of services, and checking tickets would
    delay things, offend people, and generally not work.
    
    In previous years, we would send out tickets and put a note in the
    bulletin saying that we would hold seats for members up until 10
    minutes before the services start, and that members should show
    up early, or something like that.  In reality we would send out
    the tickets and thoroughly ignore them; it worked OK, why change?
    In our new building we may do something better.
    
    Moral:  It's not the terrorists we have to fear, it's the family
    who came 20 minutes late and insists that they should be able to
    sit together...
    
    		 Paul (on the religious activities committee)