12/12/2017
Hanukkah, the eight-day Jewish Festival of Lights, begins at sunset today, December 12. VDARE.com wishes our many Jewish readers, writers AND DONORS (eat your heart out, Anti-Defamation League) a very sincere Happy. (So does Donald J. Trump, our illustration is from his tweet this evening).VDARE.com often gets in trouble for using the description "Jewish Kwanzaa" for Hanukkah (although it actually came from American Heritage’s Frederic Schwarz). So we were particularly interested to find, via Stephen Frank of the California Political Review, a funny and charming column by Jeff Dunetz, Hannukah Starts On Tuesday So Here’s 18 Differences Between Chanukah & Christmas. Dunetz (using the festival’s many spellings deliberately) specifically says (emphases in original throughout):
Christmas is a major Christian holiday. Chanukah is a minor Jewish holiday. Chanukkah is only a big deal in America because Jewish parents wanted their kids to be able to brag about getting gifts also. But that is a fabrication of Jews in America.Dunetz also writes:
Most Christians do not get upset if you wish them a Happy Hannukah, but many Jews and most atheists get upset if you wish them a Merry Christmas. “Happy Holidays” is a stupid PC term. Technically it can refer to July 4th, Thanksgiving, or a Satanic holiday. If you are not Christian and somebody wishes you a Merry Christmas, grow up! It’s the thought that counts (and who knows maybe they will buy you a present).And, even more remarkably,
Christmas is about “Peace on Earth,” Chanukah is about a civil war. Peace on Earth is a big theme of Christmas. Everybody –even non-Christians know this. It says it in almost all the Christmas carols. Chanukah is about a civil war against assimilation. The real Chanukkah story is not just a war against the Syrian-Greeks and throwing them out of Jerusalem and the Holy Temple, it’s about a civil war amongst the Jews. Judah Maccabee and the boys were fighting other Jews who had turned away from their faith by combining it with Greek/Hellenistic practices. The resulting assimilation caused a loss of Jewish faith and tradition, and eventually laws against practicing Jewish ritual. Sadly while Chanukah is a holiday about Jews fighting against assimilation, some ACLU-progressive-liberal types would have us celebrate it by assimilating “Menorahs” in nativity scenes, or putting trees in their homes have no understanding of the meaning of the holiday. A message to my Gentile friends, you have a nice holiday enjoy it–but don’t combine it with my holiday about assimilation.Dunetz concludes:
Chanukah and Christmas are totally different holidays with totally different meanings but whichever one you celebrate…I wish you all a joyous holiday surrounded family and friends. And may God fill the coming year with love, good health, and peace.To which VDARE.com says Amen (or words to that effect).
Oh, and in parallel with the contemporary imperative that Christmas can never be mentioned except in the same breath as the nearest non-Christian festival: Happy Our Lady of Guadelupe Day!
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