In defense of Halloween’s virtues: A Jewish take on neighborliness
As an Orthodox Jew, part of a community in which Halloween is not one of our sacred days, I have no Halloween traditions.
But as a resident of New York City who finds the constant ringing of my apartment’s doorbell and shouts of “trick or treat” by costumed youngsters one night each year at the end of October to be very annoying, I have my own unofficial custom – I keep my door closed and my lights out. I don’t answer the doorbell ringing. And I pretend that I am not home. No bags of candy bars to pass out to the kids and their adult escorts, no apples or other stuff to put in their bags.
But I have second thoughts this year …
My friend Ed, a middle-aged, dedicated-but-not-Orthodox Jew who lives in a city in the northeast US and grew up doing trick or treating every year, showed me last year, during the week after Halloween, that my anti-social tradition is misguided.
Ed said he feels sad that Halloween – from what he has observed at his home – is on the decline, among Jews and non-Jews.
Halloween, he told me, is the one time a year when people who live near each other but rarely (outside of a formal block party, or apartment building celebration or resident’s council meeting) have the opportunity to meet each other. In a low-pressure, social setting. In other words, at the front door of someone who is offering a welcome – and something from a bag of candy – to his or her neighbors.
I’d never considered that perspective.
Consider me a Halloween convert.
Not that I’m going shopping for a costume this year. Not that I am about to embrace the little-understood meaning of Halloween, which is based both in Christianity and pagan ritual. Not that I’m looking forward to the night of young strangers ringing my doorbell. But I am willing to curtail my curmudgeonly behavior. Not as an Orthodox Jew, but as a resident of New York City who, typical of Big Apple residents, barely knows his neighbors.
The traditional, superficial, knee-jerk Jewish take on Halloween: not only do its pagan, non-Jewish roots conflict with basic Jewish monotheistic beliefs (not that most kids who carve up pumpkins for their front porch, or traipse around their neighborhoods while garbed in Captain America or princess costumes give any thought to the night’s background in ancient Druid-Celtic practice, marking the end of the summer harvest season, or later as Christianity’s “All Saints’ Day”), but Judaism offers an alternative holiday when youngsters can dress up in the costume of their choice or of their making. Purim.
A predictable retort to Halloween.
But these critics are missing the point. Of Halloween and of Purim.
Halloween, as my friend Ed made clear to me, is more than a few hours of organized revelry and door-to-door solicitation of sweets. It has grown into an annual peripatetic block party, a kid-centered movable feast, a chance for the parental escorts and the candy-distributing adults to introduce themselves to each other. It’s a meet-your-neighbor opportunity.
And Purim?
It’s more than a night and a next-morning Megillah reading and a dress-up/game-playing Purim shpiel and a home-based holiday seudah and (at least in parts of my Orthodox community) a chance for some shikur-level imbibing of alcohol under putative rabbinical supervision. (Sometimes yeshiva bochurs go around the Jewish community to collect money for their school or for some other favored tzedakah, but their rounds are usually confined to already familiar homes.)
Purim, which commemorates victory over anti-Semites, is ultimately a celebration of survival, a connection to our ancient roots, an assertion of the virtues of Jewish self-defense.
It is a day that exudes self-confidence. It reflects our spiritual growth beyond our heathen past. In this spirit, we should have the confidence, and the strength of our Jewish beliefs, to be able to recognize the popularity of Halloween without denigrating its adherents, to see that our neighbors are not our enemies.
In other words, one lesson of Purim should be an understanding that the beliefs that shaped the beginnings of Halloween in the distant past have nothing to do with our triumphant present. Purim is a glorious time, during a month when the Rabbis say we are supposed to increase our joy. It has no more intrinsic relationship to Halloween, than Chanukah does to Christmas – but the former has adopted the gift-giving aspect of the latter.
But Purim, like other Jewish holidays, is centered in the synagogue (or the local JCC) or in the home. On Jewish holidays, for religious and historical reasons, we look inward. They are not times to reach out, or to accept hands reached out to us (even to accept a candy bar).
As a minority, often physically and socially isolated from the majority population, we are likely to find this attitude of separation physically and psychologically unhealthy.
But none of our holidays offer an opportunity for people to informally introduce themselves to their neighbors – which (in communities where we often do not know, beyond a nod and a hurried “Good morning!” on the way to work, the people who live on our block or in our apartment building) is important for simple conviviality and for safety. In case of a fire or of another danger that might threaten one’s neighborhood or one’s building.
How many of us in urban settings know, on a first-name basis, many of our Jewish or non-Jewish neighbors?
I certainly don’t, and I don’t think I am unusual in this respect.
As Ed educated me, Halloween offers another model. Not a religious holiday, it does not present the theological challenges for a Jew that Christian holidays like Christmas or Easter do. We needn’t join our non-Jewish neighbors in their houses of worship. We don’t have to acquiesce in non-Jewish beliefs. We don’t have to compromise our beliefs.
If we dress up and walk around our neighborhoods, we are not celebrating Halloween; we are not accepting its “spiritual” foundation; we’re just putting on costumes and collecting goodies that are not good for our teeth. We’re demonstrating the concept of Hachnasat Orchim, providing hospitality – albeit at our homes’ front door. We are not compromising our beliefs.
A smile never hurts.
OK, it’s not our holiday! But so what? Will telling our bag-in-hand non-Jewish neighbors that “it’s not our holiday” increase their respect for us? Roasting a turkey on Thanksgiving or attending a July 4th parade is not an intrinsically Jewish act, but neither conflicts with halacha, or with our roles as helpful neighbors or loyal citizens.
When I was growing up in Buffalo, in a typical identified-but-not-Orthodox family, I took part in Halloween, like most of our neighbors. Pumpkin. Cheesy costumes. House-to-house solicitation for some sweets. UNICEF carton in hand. Candy ready to hand out alongside my folks to our peers at our front door.
It was all good natured – the implied threat of a trick if we did not receive a high-caloric treat was empty words; we had no malevolent action in mind, not even the toilet paper or egg-throwing pranks favored by some delinquent miscreants.
It was a two-day yom tov then, Halloween followed by All Saint’s Eve (now lightly observed, it was established by the early Church to honor Christian saints and martyrs, but has become overshadowed by Halloween); more candy, more business for our dentists.
None of my Jewish friends, all of whom spent some time in some after-school Hebrew School, considered whether doing Halloween clashed with our Jewish beliefs – we were just dressin’ up and getting some free candy – any more than we thought that singing Christmas carols in our public school negated our Jewish feelings. That’s what everyone did.
While an estimated two-thirds of families in the US do Halloween in some way, few of them incorporate the night’s pagan or religious aspects.
It’s simply a chance to fatten the bottom line of costume manufacturers and pumpkin growers.
I don’t have to do my own trick-or-treatin’ on Halloween, or encourage my Jewish friends to have their kids do it. But I don’t have to be a Scrooge about Halloween – oops, wrong holiday!
I understand that the foundations of Halloween are fundamentally far from Judaism. But I don’t have to agree with them to offer a smile and a Snicker’s bar to kids who ring my doorbell once a year. Civility does not equal acceptance.
Halloween is a harmless holiday. For the participants, it’s a few hours walking in the fresh autumn air. For the parents, it’s a chance to share “When I was your age …” stories with their kids. For the kids, it’s a chance to express their individuality.
For the people at home, it’s a chance to demonstrate some friendship and Menschlichkeit.
On Halloween this year, my misanthropic attitude will be different than in past years. I won’t begrudge the evening’s visitors. I won’t keep my apartment door locked. I won’t keep the lights off. I’ll keep a few bagsful of sweets handy to pass out to trick-or-treating kids and their parents.
And maybe I’ll meet some of my neighbors.
