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Does your family/community celebrate American Thanksgiving?
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youngishbear




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Nov 26 2014, 5:13 pm
Barbara wrote:
My friends may not be representative, having grown up in a big city (we all went to school together), and being extremely liberal.


Does that matter?

If they have Native American ancestry, their response to Thanksgiving may very well be resentment or a feeling of having been cheated out of what was once theirs. I don't know what you mean by this.
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Frumdoc




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Nov 26 2014, 5:56 pm
R Moshe wrote at least 4 teshuvot about it, one of which said you should not celebrate every year, due to chukas hagoy, but every alternate year is ok. A dinner guest was discussing this last shabbos, but I missed the other answers as I was busy serving...

We don't, as we don't live in the US, I only became properly aware of it through Amazon sales a few years ago. My American friends do.
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Scrabble123




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Nov 26 2014, 6:31 pm
rosenbal wrote:
Not neccesarily. My parents immigrated from a communist country and celebrate Thanksgiving and always toast this country and thank G-d for it. I've rarely seen natural born Americans appreciate it as much. Yes, people celerate TG, but they don't always appreciate our country and what it stands for. Sometimes it takes an immigrant to point it out.


My grandmothers who moved here from Europe always put out an American flag on July 4th. They noticed that none of their younger, American born neighbors do anymore......
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sweetpotato




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Nov 26 2014, 7:11 pm
We do celebrate it. I wouldn't be opposed to having Thanksgiving food on Shabbos and doing nothing Thursday, but my husband would never go for it. He loves Thanksgiving, and he always points out that there does exist a mesorah for American Jews to observe it-- at Shearith Israel in Manhattan they have a special service on Thanksgiving.

My in-laws host Thanksgiving and do most of the cooking, so I can't really complain about that either. I just make the pies, which are my specialty Smile
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Emily Thorne




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Nov 26 2014, 7:23 pm
heidi wrote:
I can bet you if anyone in Boro Park or Williamsburg tried to be as outwardly Jewish as they are in America, tried to get the amazing benefits and freedoms that they enjoy, in any other country in the world they would find out that they should be extraordinarily grateful to be living in the US of A.

Eating a turkey on Thanksgiving doesn't make you more or less frum-- but it is certainly NOT chukas hagoyim to take a day and thank Hashem for allowing you to live in a country that allows you the freedom to not even know when a national holiday "comes out."


Thats not what I said. I asked how does eating turkey show gratitude? I personally think making groups of people to clean our parks is more appreciation. And btw, there are various poskim that hold it is chukas hagoy! so I dont why you SO sure about it
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PinkFridge




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Nov 26 2014, 7:46 pm
BlueRose52 wrote:
See this old thread: http://imamother.com/forum/vie.....68080


Lovely. Don't know how I missed it the first time around but I'm glad I did Wink
Bkitzur, to answer OP, no, not in the full turkey sense. My father felt that unless it was a simcha or yom tov, he didn't like to have a heavy meal so close to Shabbos and we saved the turkey for Purim. (2nd edit: I should talk to his sister because I'm curious if he grew up with Thanksgiving. Probably not because if he did and it was important to his father, who was extremely close geographically, we would have done Thanksgiving regardless. My grandfather probably didn't grow up with it because they were really poor.) That said, we did sometimes go visit family Thanksgiving weekend, and throughout all my formal education, in BY and seminary, I don't think a year passed by that it wasn't stressed that the idea behind Thanksgiving is a good thing and we should reflect on how fortunate we are to be in such a malchus shel chessed. And like mothers' and fathers' day, we can avoid the holiday rush and reflect throughout the year.

I don't have lots of family to get together with so to do the full meal would be excessive, anyway.

So far I think I've been pretty pareve. I will say this before going back to the rest of the thread, and hope I'm not being too controversial: I don't know if I'd base a full Shabbos on leftovers. Now sometimes leftovers can be awesome. Some relatives made us an incredible roast for my son's bar mitzvah that I froze for the yamim tovim coming up soon after. I would only serve leftovers if they were improved with reheating or repurposed into something special.

ETA #1 as I go through the thread: Barbara, I don't think you're an oinker. But if you find some relevant lyrics entering your headspace, please share!
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tryinghard




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Nov 26 2014, 9:21 pm
Frumdoc wrote:
R Moshe wrote at least 4 teshuvot about it, one of which said you should not celebrate every year, due to chukas hagoy, but every alternate year is ok. A dinner guest was discussing this last shabbos, but I missed the other answers as I was busy serving...

We don't, as we don't live in the US, I only became properly aware of it through Amazon sales a few years ago. My American friends do.


Growing up, we never celebrated it, but when I got married, DH's (non-observant) parents wanted to have TG with us. Dh is a BT, and until we got married, he was in yeshiva every year so it was not relevant. Dh looked into it, and came across the teshuvas you mention, so we do it here and there, based on my in-laws and whether they are going to come to us or not. But when we do it, we have Thanksgiving on Friday night, because it's too much for me and too hard on the kids, and my inlaws are ok with it. Last year, our schedules (Thanksgivukkah!) worked out so that we went to my inlaws, and it was my first ever "real" Thanksgiving. It was a lot of fun... but this year we aren't doing it (though I may make pumpkin pie)
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greenfire




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, Nov 27 2014, 2:58 pm
I posted this is southern bubby's words of wisdom thread - but I think it belongs here as well ... well worth the watch

great excerpt from a farbrengen wherein the lubavitcher rebbe discusses thanksgiving, yud tes kislev & chanuka

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anon for this




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, Nov 27 2014, 3:53 pm
Barbara wrote:
Well, these are a couple of the memes I keep seeing from Native American friends on Facebook.




Barbara, have you heard the Capitol Steps' Hotel Arizona (spoof of Hotel California)?

I've seen protests around Columbus Day, especially in 1992, but don't remember anything around Thanksgiving.
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marina




 
 
    
 

Post Fri, Nov 28 2014, 12:12 am
Rabbi Yossi Lew related to my husband how, when he was a little boy, the Rebbetzin would make a turkey dinner every Thanksgiving and if the Rebbe was still in shul, she would send a turkey sandwich with Yossi for the Rebbe. Lol.
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ElTam




 
 
    
 

Post Fri, Nov 28 2014, 12:30 am
I grew up celebrating Thanksgiving and have always loved the day. We use leftovers for Shabbos, but I make a few fresh things for the seudahs like a dessert and a salad l'kavod yom tov. This year, we decided to make Thanksgiving on Friday night like an "intelligent American balaboosta" should. It made Thanksgiving so depressing. So next year, back to our minhag. (We are JPF.)
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amother


 

Post Fri, Nov 28 2014, 3:27 am
Posting as amother because there aren't many people like me on this thread or in the frum community:

I'm a descendant of people who came on the Mayflower on one side of the family. On the other side of my family, I'm descended from Cherokee Indians. Let's just say that my feelings about America, stealing land, colonialism, and Thanksgiving are complicated. However, I love the fall and try to look at Thanksgiving as a harvest festival. Plus, for the sake of the parent who is descended from the Mayflower, we celebrate.

However, this year that parent came to visit (!!) and we didn't really do anything. To me, the thought of cooking for Thanksgiving and Shabbos, shopping, schlepping, cleaning up, etc. was just too much. So we went out to a really nice on Wednesday night (Erev Thanksgiving), and we're going to have a fall-themed Shabbos dinner and desserts on Friday night. That's all I can do.

If I had a bigger family who came to visit, or went to see family, I'd do more. Being a Jew, the thought of spending so much money on what would basically be a 3-day yom tov makes me ill Wink
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PinkFridge




 
 
    
 

Post Fri, Nov 28 2014, 12:25 pm
amother wrote:
Posting as amother because there aren't many people like me on this thread or in the frum community:

I'm a descendant of people who came on the Mayflower on one side of the family. On the other side of my family, I'm descended from Cherokee Indians. Let's just say that my feelings about America, stealing land, colonialism, and Thanksgiving are complicated. However, I love the fall and try to look at Thanksgiving as a harvest festival. Plus, for the sake of the parent who is descended from the Mayflower, we celebrate.

However, this year that parent came to visit (!!) and we didn't really do anything. To me, the thought of cooking for Thanksgiving and Shabbos, shopping, schlepping, cleaning up, etc. was just too much. So we went out to a really nice on Wednesday night (Erev Thanksgiving), and we're going to have a fall-themed Shabbos dinner and desserts on Friday night. That's all I can do.

If I had a bigger family who came to visit, or went to see family, I'd do more. Being a Jew, the thought of spending so much money on what would basically be a 3-day yom tov makes me ill Wink


If your parent is happy with that, sounds perfect to me!
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amother


 

Post Fri, Nov 28 2014, 12:58 pm
amother wrote:
Posting as amother because there aren't many people like me on this thread or in the frum community:

I'm a descendant of people who came on the Mayflower on one side of the family. On the other side of my family, I'm descended from Cherokee Indians. Let's just say that my feelings about America, stealing land, colonialism, and Thanksgiving are complicated. However, I love the fall and try to look at Thanksgiving as a harvest festival. Plus, for the sake of the parent who is descended from the Mayflower, we celebrate.

However, this year that parent came to visit (!!) and we didn't really do anything. To me, the thought of cooking for Thanksgiving and Shabbos, shopping, schlepping, cleaning up, etc. was just too much. So we went out to a really nice on Wednesday night (Erev Thanksgiving), and we're going to have a fall-themed Shabbos dinner and desserts on Friday night. That's all I can do.

If I had a bigger family who came to visit, or went to see family, I'd do more. Being a Jew, the thought of spending so much money on what would basically be a 3-day yom tov makes me ill Wink


Wow, I would love to hear more about those complicated feelings, if you don't mind sharing. I teach American history, and I would love to share with my students the personal perspective of modern descendants.

Please do not feel obligated... one thing I learned here on imamother is that not everyone wants to "inspire others with their personal lifestory" (paraphrased from a post on a different thread.)
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Ruchel




 
 
    
 

Post Sat, Nov 29 2014, 1:53 pm
OUAT Europeans were patriotic. It’s unfortunately ended/ending. Young charedim get too extreme to do “no Jewish” things, and young MO tend to get dati/Zionistic. End of an era… some charedi places still celebrate in some way if only by a (half or full) day off.

No reason anyone is obligated. And one can be thankful without Thanksgiving and certainly without its traditions. I have nothing against secular holidays but please not mixed with shabbes.
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amother


 

Post Sun, Nov 30 2014, 3:55 am
To the amother who is a history teacher - I'd be happy to share more about my perspective on this topic with you, because I have a lot of perspectives all inside of me. However, I wouldn't feel comfortable writing about it on an open forum like this. If you want to post under your sn, or leave me some way to get in touch with you, I'd be happy to do so.
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