Recommend a Thanksgiving d'var torah to read @ table

amother

↑ OP ↓

Today at 11:38 am

amother Brickred wrote:

You're being purposely confrontational and patronizing with the yaaleh v'yavo thing.

I don't care whether what you think is appropriate. You're not my rav or a rav at all. Stop fighting with people on the internet.

amother

Taupe

Today at 11:39 am

Here’s what ChatGPT had to say.

This week’s parsha, **Vayeitzei**, provides a meaningful connection to the themes of Thanksgiving, particularly the value of gratitude. In the parsha, we read about Yaakov’s journey as he leaves his home, faces challenges, and ultimately begins to build his family and legacy.

One of the most striking moments in the parsha is Yaakov’s dream at Beit-El, where he sees a ladder reaching to the heavens with angels ascending and descending. Upon awakening, Yaakov declares, *“Surely God is in this place, and I did not know it”* (Genesis 28:16). He then sets up a stone as a monument and vows to serve God. This moment teaches us a profound lesson about recognizing blessings, even in difficult or unfamiliar circumstances.

Similarly, Thanksgiving is about taking the time to recognize and express gratitude, even amidst life’s uncertainties. Yaakov could have focused on his fear and loneliness as he fled from Esav, but instead, he chose to acknowledge God’s presence and the potential for blessing in his situation. Thanksgiving invites us to do the same—to pause, reflect, and express gratitude for the good in our lives, even when faced with challenges.

Later in the parsha, we see another connection to gratitude in the naming of Yaakov’s children. When Leah names her fourth son Yehuda, she says, *“This time I will thank God”* (Genesis 29:35). The name Yehuda, from which the word "Jew" (Yehudi) is derived, emphasizes gratitude as a core identity of the Jewish people. Just as Leah found a reason to thank God amidst her personal struggles, Thanksgiving encourages us to find moments of gratitude, regardless of our circumstances.

As we celebrate Thanksgiving this week, let us take inspiration from Parshat Vayeitzei. Like Yaakov, we can seek to recognize God’s presence in the unexpected places of our lives. Like Leah, we can practice gratitude and find reasons to give thanks, even in challenging moments. May we, as individuals and as a community, embody the spirit of thanksgiving every day, fulfilling our role as Yehudim—people who give thanks.

↑ PinkFridge ↓

Today at 11:39 am

amother DarkKhaki wrote:

This is exactly why I think it's problematic to celebrate. You want to eat a meal with family and thank the country ok, but thinking it's a yom tov and you should bring torah to it? That's going way too far.

Who says it's yom tov?
What's more chukas hagy -- eating turkey or being grateful that we live in a malchus shel chesed?
Maybe OP's hosting her extended family that she can't get together with for a seder. Why not elevate the meal?

zaq ↓

Today at 11:40 am

amother Brickred wrote:

But we're supposed to be thankful to God all day every day, not just on Thanksgiving....
"Thanksgiving Dvar Torah" is just a weird thing to say. It's not shabbos or yom tov l'havdil.

We're also supposed to remember יציאת מצרים כל ימי חייך, yet we have a dedicated holiday to commemorate it as well. Similarly, you remember and mourn deceased loved ones on a daily basis, but you have added observances on the Yahrzeit and days when Yizkor is said.

Daily remembrance and appreciation do not conflict with or negate an annual event emphasizing said remembrance and appreciation.

amother

↑ Brickred ↓

Today at 11:41 am

amother OP wrote:

I'm not fighting. I don't mean to be confrontational. I'm just asking. You're getting way to worked up about this.

amother

↑ Brickred

Today at 11:42 am

zaq wrote:

Those are all min hatorah.
Thanksgiving is not min hatorah or halacha.

amother

Yarrow ↓

Today at 11:47 am

amother OP wrote:

We get it. You don't think much of thanksgiving. No need for you to participate in this thread. Other people get what I'm asking and have been helpful. There's absolutely nothing wrong with bringing torah to the thanksgiving table.

Bringing Torah to the table is always a wonderful idea. May I suggest looking up Rav Moshe Feinstein’s responsa that discuss celebrating Thanksgiving. His response sefarim are called אגרות משה. There’s a volume where you can look up which tshuvas discuss any topic. There are at least three regarding Thanksgiving, I think more. You can choose whichever you find most interesting. Rav Moshe was widely accepted as THE possek of America so I can’t think of a more appropriate person to quote on this topic.

amother

↑ Yarrow

Today at 11:49 am

zaq wrote:

Comparing the commemoration of יציאת מצרים in any shape or form to Thanksgiving crosses a dangerous line.
To quote a U.S. president,
DON’T

↑ PinkFridge ↓

Today at 11:50 am

amother Brickred wrote:

How do you know that there's nothing wrong with bringing torah to the Thanksgiving table? A holiday that has Cristian roots?
We're supposed to be thankful to hashem all day every day. Do you say a d'var torah at the dinner table every day?

There was another thread on this. Someone I know who follows Rabbi Soloveitchik sent me a Commentary article on the subject where one of the founding fathers said, in discussion on making this a national holiday, that this gratitude has its roots in the Torah (our part) and is "not European but Hebraic."

↑ PinkFridge ↓

Today at 11:51 am

amother Brickred wrote:

I like Thanksgiving. I appreciate the day.
I'm just questioning the appropriateness of having a "Thanksgiving Dvar Torah". You should have a dvar Torah every day......
Will you also say yaaleh v'yavo at benching........
I'm really not interested in causing fights. I'm just asking a question. You're taking it way too personally instead of just thinking in to it.

Personally, I don't do a heavy fleishig meal on Thursday unless it's a seudas mitzvah. But if someone is going to, why not elevate it with a dvar Torah, specifically one that will inspire gratitude?

↑ PinkFridge ↓

Today at 11:51 am

eezee wrote:

more deep and not as easy a read, but also beautiful and meaningful:
https://www.torahweb.org/torah......html

Eezee, great sources. I'm sure they'll be helpful for OP.

↑ PinkFridge ↓

Today at 11:52 am

amother OP wrote:

Amother can start a new thread.

amother

↑ OP ↓

Today at 12:00 pm

amother Brickred wrote:

I'm not fighting. I don't mean to be confrontational. I'm just asking. You're getting way to worked up about this.

You're hijacking this thread. I'm not here to debate you or answer your questions. This thread didn't call for a debate.

Thanks to all who are being helpful!

↑ zaq ↓

Today at 12:12 pm

amother Brickred wrote:

Do you say a d'var torah at the dinner table every day?

Halevai! Most of us are too lazy,ignorant or busy. But did you know that if three men ate together and DIDN'T speak divrei Torah it's considered the equivalent of an altar to עבודה זרה? That's the origin of Zimun IIRC: a formula to ensure that there are always a few words of Torah, even if by rote and formulaic.

I can't believe I'm reading a frum woman berating another with the claim that it's inappropriate to bring divrei Torah to the table. Since when are divrei Torah reserved for Shabbos and YT?

↑ zaq

Today at 12:23 pm

amother Brickred wrote:

Those are all min hatorah.
Thanksgiving is not min hatorah or halacha.

Don't be deliberately obtuse. Of course they're not equivalent, and if you choose not to celebrate T-day that's your right, given that you're not endangering your immortal soul. I'm refuting your assertion that an annual day of observance is meaningless and incompatible with daily acknowledgement. Obviously the two
forms of acknowledgement are not only compatible but complementary. As someone else said, don't use this thread as your personal soapbox. Get off and move to another street corner where you can preach to your cronies and leave OP to do her thing in peace.

chavalesch

Today at 2:15 pm

Is Thanksgiving a Jewish Holiday?

Thanksgiving 2024
Rabbi Micha'el Rosenberg
What does it mean to celebrate Thanksgiving as a Jew? In some sense, the question is a cipher for a larger one: What does it mean to take our identities as American and as Jewish both seriously?
We regularly speak of Moroccan Jews or Polish Jews, German Jews or Algerian Jews; we understand that each of these Jewish communities represents a meaningful expression of Judaism, reflecting both the enduring wisdom of Torah as well as specific cultural settings. In my experience, we less often think of “American Judaism” in this sense. America might be where we find ourselves, but we tend not to relate to it as our “kind” of Judaism. What does it mean to take seriously our Judaism as a uniquely American variety?1

Thanksgiving is a useful test case: a distinctly American holiday that has been the subject of halakhic debate. Modern American rabbis have disagreed about the permissibility of Jews’ observing Thanksgiving.2 Specifically, these authorities debate whether a Jew observing Thanksgiving is violating the prohibition on “walking in their ways,” that is, imitating non-Jewish customs.3

These questions are dear to my heart because I love Thanksgiving and I feel deeply connected to it as both a Jew and an American. I am therefore not interested in this dvar Torah in rehashing these debates and offering a halakhic opinion on the permissibility of celebrating Thanksgiving. Rather, I want to think about how the different concerns and ways of thinking about “walking in their ways” might shed light on what it means to take Thanksgiving seriously, not simply as a holiday celebrated by Jews, but in some real sense as a Jewish holiday. How can I acknowledge both the very real ways in which I am, at my core, American, as well as the equally real ways in which my American identity challenges my Jewish one?

There are, broadly speaking, two competing positions in classical halakhic sources about when practices from the dominant culture are forbidden. The more lenient opinion, which is followed by the Rema in the Shulhan Arukh, takes logical legibility as the standard for what is allowed.4 In the words of the Ran, “The Torah forbade only those ordinances that are idolatrous, I.e., things of vanity and emptiness, provided that they are needed for their idolatry. But sensible things are permitted.”5

The definition of “walking in their ways,” then, is precisely doing things that are otherwise insensible. That is a somewhat perplexing definition, though. There might not be any deep meaning to eating turkey on the fourth Thursday in November, but why should that make it forbidden? We can answer this question with another: If an act makes no sense, why would I do it? In the context of being a minority culture, adopting otherwise meaningless practices of the majority might indicate internal ambivalence about the relative worth of my own tradition. Why would I eat turkey specifically on the fourth Thursday in November? Perhaps because I want to be like my neighbors, implying an insecurity in my own identity.

In the Rema’s interpretation of “walking in their ways,” for Thanksgiving to be a holiday that embraces my Judaism rather than an expression of assimilationism, it must be meaningful. Indulging in turkey and stuffing and sweet potatoes with marshmallows on top, just because it’s a quaint practice, is a failure to observe Thanksgiving as a Jew and instead reflects cultural envy and insecurity. By contrast, when I take the day seriously, marking it as a day of gratitude, it is no longer a reflection of my Jewish ambivalence, but rather an understandable expression of my thanks—a completely sensible practice even in the context of Jewish tradition.

There is another, more stringent view about “walking in their ways,” and it too is instructive. For Tosafot, even a practice that makes sense is threatening if it comes from another culture. Indeed, its legibility through a universal human lens might make it more threatening.6

What would the Tosafot think if they could see American Thanksgiving? I imagine that they would see a celebration of gratitude, timed to the local harvest, and perceive this as profoundly reasonable, meritorious even—and for that reason: threatening. Precisely because this holiday makes sense, it challenges my commitment to Judaism. If I express my annual gratitude at harvest-time through Thanksgiving—a holiday that benefits from the cultural reinforcement of its ubiquitous presence on media and in the grocery store aisles—then why do I need Sukkot?

I think, however, that there is something deeper about Thanksgiving in particular that might lead even the Tosafot to think of it as something nonthreatening for Jewish identity. R. Avraham Yitzhak Sperling of Levov explains why, uniquely among the Amidah’s 19 blessings, the congregation recites an alternative version of the thanksgiving blessing (Modim) during the repetition of the Amidah:

ספר טעמי המנהגים ומקורי הדינים, קו
מפני שאין דרך העבד להודות לרבו… ע"י שליח. אלא כל אדם צריך לקבל בפיו עול מלכות שמים.

Sefer Ta’amei ha-Minhagim u-Mekorei ha-Dinim, #106
Because it is not the way of a servant to thank their master… by means of a messenger. Rather, each person must, with their own mouth, accept the sovereignty of Heaven.7
In R. Sperling’s view, how can I let the prayer leader utter words of thanks to God while I stand numbly by, unmoved by the call to gratitude?

Likewise, when I dwell in a culture expressing its thanks in near unison, for me not to do so is not merely a missed opportunity—it is a kind of spiritual degradation, an act that could lead to a growing callousness and insensitivity to the good that God has done for us.

To observe Thanksgiving as a Jew, then, means to take it seriously as a day of gratitude. It means to recognize that while my core practices are those bequeathed to me by the Torah, my spiritual life must reflect the cultural realities in which I live. In a very real sense, to observe Thanksgiving as a Jew means to treat it seriously as a religious holiday, even if its functionally “secular” nature is precisely what makes it halakhically permissible in the first place.

May we all be blessed to have a day of true gratitude, reflecting our inheritance as both Americans and as Jews.

shabbatiscoming ↓

Today at 2:38 pm

amother DarkKhaki wrote:

Of course there is.

Why ever would there be something wrong in saying a dvar torah at a nice meal?
What has the world come to that someone could find something wrong with this?

If you have nothing nice to say, why say this at all? It adds nothing but strife and not nice feelings to this otherwise pareve post.

↑ shabbatiscoming

Today at 2:40 pm

amother Brickred wrote:

I'm not fighting. I don't mean to be confrontational. I'm just asking. You're getting way to worked up about this.

You are fighting. The op asked for a dvar torah. Your answers have ZERO to do wit that.

Elfrida

Today at 2:46 pm

amother OP wrote:

Something more Jonathan Sacks style - like connecting TG to the Torah.

Rabbi Lord Sacks was English. Thanksgiving is (or was) a purely American celebration, so not something that he would have related to, or written about.

↑ PinkFridge

Today at 2:54 pm

Elfrida wrote:

Rabbi Lord Sacks was English. Thanksgiving is (or was) a purely American celebration, so not something that he would have related to, or written about.

She wanted that style. But when I googled, I found some hits that (without opening) seemed like they could work.
And over the centuries, there has been rapprochement across the pond ( Wink

) so he may well, somewhere, have addressed a critical mass of Jews elsewhere.