Hallow, Are You There?

Every year the Jewish blogosphere buzzes about how Jews really aren’t supposed to celebrate Halloween because it’s Christian Pagan bad for the digestion not Jewish.

Some rabbis say it’s OK to give out candy but not to dress up; others nix the whole deal and say ignore the meshuggeneh goyim and save your costumes for Purim.

I say, FEH. While it may have had ritualistic origins long ago, Halloween can hardly be called someone else’s religious holiday anymore. Unless you count zombies.

You have to be really reaching to see Halloween as anything other than a secular, American holiday that exists only so children can OD on high fructose corn syrup and women with very little imagination have an excuse to dress up like slutty nurses or slutty pirates. While I struggle plenty to reconcile with my version of Judaism with everyone else’s, Halloween is not one of my issues. (But why chicken parmesan is not kosher is.)

It’s a way to participate in community, not just your Jewish one, but the one you actually live in if your live somewhere besides within an eruv. If Halloween isn’t Jewish enough for you, then you make it Jewish, OK? Here are a few tips:

*Answer the door for trick-or-treaters in full tefillin and tell the kids that laser beams will come out and fry them if they take more than one piece of candy

*Hang a skeleton from the mezuzzah

*Give away chopped liver

*Dress up as a zombie Amy Winehouse, complete with extra eyeliner and empty bottle of Manischewitz

*Drink He’Brew beer while trailing behind your children as they schnorr for candy

And now, I have fake blood to administer to some little Jewish zombies. See you on the street.

One thought on “Hallow, Are You There?

  1. HAHAHA! This is some funny funny stuff, quite a narrative you got going here, keep up the good work~~
    I myself am a teenager who’s going through the… ahem… phase where you’re not all there because you’re high all the time. But I say FEH
    Nothing’s worse that High Fructose Corn Syrup
    OH LORD
    Me being a diabetic and all, I preferr to eat healthy foods, even though I’m not devoted to any particular religion but do share a relationship with a higher entity that I like to call “God” when I talk to him.

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