My Two Shekels: Should Jews celebrate challah-ween?
Halloween may not be ours to celebrate, but it can still offer inspiration
There’s plenty of evidence to suggest Halloween is not a Jewish festival. Originally in May, the Christian festival of saints was moved in the ninth century to November, when harvests could provide food for pilgrims travelling to observe All Hallows.
Trick-or-treating evolved from a medieval European custom of door-to-door begging for ‘soul cakes’ in exchange for prayers for dead relatives.
Even seen as a modern secular occasion, the festival has aspects contrary to Jewish values. Its celebration of death and the occult contrasts with Jewish emphasis on ‘choosing life’ and Torah’s prohibition of witchcraft or sorcery.
Handing out sweets at our front doors seems harmless (if perhaps not to dentists) until you remember the threat of ‘tricks’ unless ‘treats’ are provided. Children too young to tell the difference between fantasy and reality can be easily scared by costumed revellers, even without the recent creepy-clown craze.
Halloween may not be ours to celebrate, but it can still offer inspiration. As Tishri has just reminded us, the Jewish calendar is full of our own festivals. Imagine how enriched our Jewish lives could be if we poured into them the same energy and creativity that many people put into Halloween!
We have our own opportunity for dressing up and creating a little chaos at Purim; it’s never too early to start thinking about costumes, so browse those Halloween shelves for ideas! Instead of carving pumpkins, we can get artistic with the lights in our windows at Chanukah.
Succot encourages us to decorate our temporary homes and welcome guests into them; Shavuot invites late-night festive get-togethers. Purim and Pesach offer the opportunity to present food gifts to strangers, but there’s no time limit on keeping a bowl of change by the door to donate to charity collectors.
By cooking with seasonal foods to reflect the changing year, we have chance to make each Shabbat meal a fresh delight. Giving out sweets to callers can build friendly relationships with neighbours.
Beyond that, however, it might be easier to avoid feelings of missing out on Halloween when we truly celebrate our own festivals, investing them with love and creativity.
Thank you for helping to make Jewish News the leading source of news and opinion for the UK Jewish community. Today we're asking for your invaluable help to continue putting our community first in everything we do.
For as little as £5 a month you can help sustain the vital work we do in celebrating and standing up for Jewish life in Britain.
Jewish News holds our community together and keeps us connected. Like a synagogue, it’s where people turn to feel part of something bigger. It also proudly shows the rest of Britain the vibrancy and rich culture of modern Jewish life.
You can make a quick and easy one-off or monthly contribution of £5, £10, £20 or any other sum you’re comfortable with.
100% of your donation will help us continue celebrating our community, in all its dynamic diversity...
Engaging
Being a community platform means so much more than producing a newspaper and website. One of our proudest roles is media partnering with our invaluable charities to amplify the outstanding work they do to help us all.
Celebrating
There’s no shortage of oys in the world but Jewish News takes every opportunity to celebrate the joys too, through projects like Night of Heroes, 40 Under 40 and other compelling countdowns that make the community kvell with pride.
Pioneering
In the first collaboration between media outlets from different faiths, Jewish News worked with British Muslim TV and Church Times to produce a list of young activists leading the way on interfaith understanding.
Campaigning
Royal Mail issued a stamp honouring Holocaust hero Sir Nicholas Winton after a Jewish News campaign attracted more than 100,000 backers. Jewish Newsalso produces special editions of the paper highlighting pressing issues including mental health and Holocaust remembrance.
Easy access
In an age when news is readily accessible, Jewish News provides high-quality content free online and offline, removing any financial barriers to connecting people.
Voice of our community to wider society
The Jewish News team regularly appears on TV, radio and on the pages of the national press to comment on stories about the Jewish community. Easy access to the paper on the streets of London also means Jewish News provides an invaluable window into the community for the country at large.
We hope you agree all this is worth preserving.
