A Jewish Christmas

Christmas for the Jewish man...


Mother was Jewish, of course she stopped that when she became a Methodical. I mean a Methodist which was before I was born. But then we lived upstairs for a long time from the Synagogue where the Rabbi and his wife were. He was my first Rabbi and in those early days we became familiar as he was part of my first religious rite. Yeah, I got Jewish, blessing and all about 4 months before they sprinkled me with baptismal water in the Methodist church. It's no wonder I had such a holier than thou attitude as a child.

Fast forward, mother was usually into Christmas. We even had 2 or 3 trees. There was the live fire hazard tree, the plastic fake tree and often a spare tree just for the heck of it. Hey, when it comes to Christmas you can't be having too many trees. Then there were the decorations. Ornaments everywhere.. Yeah, I mean everywhere, even on lightswitch plates and doorkobs as well as each pane in the window and several manger scenes and the Advent calendars. Be sure to get an advent calendar, they are great fun opening the little windows throughout the days before Christmas.

We stayed mostly Christian those early years, except of course for our constant supply of all things matzo. We had cartons of matzo and of course Passover wasn't complete without our goodies bag from Barton's Candy stores, including the Haggadah. I always made sure I was in the city for Passover time and then one year we had our first actual Seder. Wine, wine and more wine. My sister even got drunk. Me, I behaved and didn't drink Elijah's wine until after all the guests had left the room. My Jewish blood knew that it would be a sin to waste the wine, so I drained the glass. I believe I bonded with Elijah that night.

But you are discussing Christmas and being Jewish and having a new experience. You better learn to like fruitcake, that's what Christmas is all about, the regifting of the fruitcakes.

And stockings. Make sure all 3 of you have your Christmas stockings hanging by the chimney. If there isn't a chimney in your home, get some posterboard and paint and make one. Santa can even come down painted chimneys so long as theirs a plate of latkes and a fresh kugel on the table when he arrives. Uncle Bert told me all about the truth about Santa. It turns out Santa was originally a Polish Jew. Yeah, that helps explain his beard and all and how nice a man he is and why you have to put out food for him.

Turns out Santa felt that maybe the Christians were always being a little downcast around Chanukah time what with they not having all the delightful tales of a drop of oil what could boin for 8 nights. All they had was having to trek through deep drifts of snow in the coldest part of the winter and in the middle of the night at that. Oi! Meantime, the Jewish folk, were snug inside their homes cooking delicious latkes, baking kugels (both potato and noodle), having a wonderful time.

So. Like I says, which is what Uncle Bert told me, Santa was originally Shlomo Bronfowictz and he adored making people happy and that was why he created the being of Santa Claus. It's true I tell you. Uncle Bert never lied.

The nice thing here is that you can also get the little one 8 nice gifts for Chanukah, which this year neatly surrounds Christmas begining Decemeber 2o and going to the 28th.


No movie theater on Christmas? You must really love these guys to give that up.

Have a happy merry Chanukmas.

It's going to be a Catholic and Jewish wedding

That's me, kinda. Lapsed Catholic husband, and I'm 1/2 Jewish (more culturally than religiously Jewish -- in fact not at all religiously Jewish).

Hey that reminds me, sozlet liked this book when she was little (we do Christmas and Hanukkah):



http://www.amazon.com/Light-Lights-Celebrating-Hanukkah-Christmas/dp/0590483838

edit, here's another one by the same author, with a younger boy as the protagonist:

http://www.amazon.com/My-Two-Holidays-Hanukkah-Christmas/dp/0545235154/ref=pd_sim_b_1

Make sure you buy a tree that already has the lights on it.

Wait a minute . . . are Jews allowed to have fun on Christmas ? ! ? ! ? There oughta be a law . . .

He's now shopping online for that book

I can only vouch for the first one, I thought the second one was the same author but no.

Looks good from reviews though.

In Florida there probably is a law lol.

Scary thought . . . but you're in the deep **** already, no? I mean, bein' Puerto Rican, gay and well off?

The well off comes from the Jewish side of the family,

Jewish Christmas has quite a long tradition here in Germany: in 2004, the Jewish Museum Berlin had an exhibition about more than two hundred years of "Weihnukka" (= 'Chrisnukka') in Germany. (That was, I suppose, the reason, why the Central Council of Jews in Germany published an article about how say "Happy Weihnukka in Russian".

From Else Lasker-Schüler on The Lost Bridge of Jews and Christians:


This weekend, there's a "Weihnukka Market" in the Westphalian Jewish Museum's museum village.

I ordered the book online and then went shopping on horrible black Friday. Bought a Christmas reef for the door and an artificial tree with lights, we will put it up and decorate it this Sunday. My parents would never approve of a Christmas tree in a Jewish home but if they knew Antonio I believe they would have ran out and bought him one themselves.

Interesting to hear about "fruit cakes," because I bought the "famous" stollen cake in Dresden a few weeks ago that we're going to have on Christmas day.

I can't say I've actually tasted a fruitcake.

Stollen isn't really a cake. It is a yeast bread.

Great stuff, but definitely not a cake, let alone a fruit cake.

Stollen is so good, especially the Marzipan ones, there is no comparison to
fruitcake. I don't think people do fruitcake any longer - at least I haven't seen one in years.

jcboy, as I said before: it doesn't matter what you celebrate and how you celebrate as long as you start a tradition for the three of you and repeat it every year. I always celebrated with my Jewish friends all their holidays and on Christmas they came to celebrate at our house.

I think it would be a good idea if you introduced Antonio to your holidays as well. I am sure he'll be delighted to celebrate Chanukah and Christmas.

I'm fond of wreaths - made some pretty big ones back in north north - not the one in the photo, never as large, that's by my then business partner, but gives an idea. They're built around metal rings..

back after scanning and photobucketing.

ehBeth, Thanks for that correction; I just remember buying it at a bakery, and didn't make the distinction between cake and bread. The picture I saw made it look like a "cake" to me rather than a bread. Learn something new every day...

I'm not any religion but have some emotional connections to some (in sequential order, catholic, jewish, buddhist.)

I like one fruitcake and one fruitcake only, and that involves Hennesey Cognac aging via cheesecloth around the loaf or loaves for weeks.

But never mind that -

Here's a wreath, not shown from the best side, but with us in the middle, my niece and me a bunch of years ago.



And us in front of a local to the area famous house - (we're looking smug staring at her father, who's a good guy but opinionated as all get out) -