Sunday, December 09, 2012

Are Holidays Mere Parties?

Daniel Greenberg at Sultan Knish believes that holidays are not mere parties:

Holidays aren't mere parties, they are messages. Knots of time that we tie around the fingers of our lives so that we remember what our ancestors meant us to never forget. That they lived and died for a reason. The party is a celebration, but if we forget what it celebrates, then it becomes a celebration of celebration. A hollow and soulless festival of the self. The Maccabees fought because they believed they had something worth fighting for. Not for their possessions, but for their traditions, their families and their G-d. The celebration of Chanukah is not just how we remember them, but how we remember that we are called upon to keep their watch. To take up their banner and carry their sword.

The new Maccabees are farmers and teachers, men and women who build families and homes in the lands of their ancestors, who brave the threats of terrorists and international tyrants to live their lives and raise their children. Knowing that they will not be allowed to live in peace, that everything they stand for is hated by the UN, in the capitals of great empires and even by their own government, they still put flame to wick and mark the first day of many days of the miracle that revived the spirit of a nation and inspires it to this day.

Nor are they allowed to live in peace in Jerusalem. In Cairo, the Muslim Brotherhood dispatches paid rapists to harass protesters and runs torture chambers for opponents of Morsi, without a word of direct condemnation from Washington. But Jewish homes always earn a swift condemnation from Washington and Brussels.

Read more here: http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/2012/12/a-holiday-of-resistance.html

No comments: