It drives me banana's when frummies say they're anti-mother's day, or anti-father's day, or whatever other day there is that they're anti (there's plenty of them, I can go on for pages!).
What's wrong with celebrating mother's day? There are things that goyim come up with, that are actually good ideas -*gasp*- Hallmark made it up? Maybe, so who cares? The economy isn't at its greatest, why not take advantage of a "silly" holiday as a way to encourage money circulation?
But really, I love my mommy, and I love my daddy. As much as I should be "honoring" and "fearing" them, I really don't. I mean, I'm totally respectful. My mom is literally on call 24/6, and she's tired all the time, and my father is well... an interesting character. I help my mom clean, I cook, I do most of the laundry (not lately, this semester has been killer), and I stay up late talking to her and whatever else if she wants me to. Generally my family is very close. Yet still, why not have a day specifically where my mom gets to choose what we eat (as opposed to Benny's which we go to allll the time)?
I remember once in my HS the class made an attempt at an official debate. We split up in two teams, we did some research, came back the next day and argued. Somehow we went off topic (duh- this is my wacko HS we're talking about!) and we ended up discussing mother's day. So one girl on the opposing team was like "You don't need a day to honor your mother, you should be doing it everyday. It's so fake to set aside one day"
So I remember VERY quickly stating "Yea, so the 10 days between Rosh Hoshanah and Yom Kippur are fake?"
Boy was she stumped... hehe. And the teacher (obviously on her side) had nothing to say either.
I remember the one thing in HS that I enjoyed was messing with the teachers. :)
Happy Mothers Day to those of you who are mothers, and CHILDREN- be good! :)
12 comments:
I've always loved the idea of Mother's day it reminds me of what I have to be thankful for. My mom has never been into it though her mother always has so we get to celebrate anyways with my grandmother.
How do you not believe in mothers day? It's not a religious holiday.
Ignore the people who are "anti" it (whatever that's supposed to mean). If you want to set aside a day to make your mom feel EXTRA special, then you should. Do these people also not celebrate birthdays because you should be thanking G-d for being born every day?
Jessica: I might be taking somethign I heard out of context, but I heard that Jews should not celebrate their own birthdays, but rather they should give brachos to others...b/c theres really nothing for them to celebrate.
I will try to ask around.
I've heard the brachos thing. Didn't know it was in exchange for celebration though.
Your teachers answer could've been:
Starting in Elul and including the aseres yomei teshuva, Hashem gives us a special strength to become close to Him. However, silly girl, Hashem does not give us a special koach to honor our mothers and fathers on one Sunday every may and June.
But i'm just playing devils advocate (I got and will be giving flowers in the AM)
fa. anony. :)
I think the resistance to Mothers Day is simply that there's no history for it. Nevertheless, Mothers Day has caught on precisely because many people think it's a good idea.
"Look not at the vessel, but by what it contains. There are new vessels with aged (delicious) wine, and old vessels that contain no wine at all."--Pirkei Avot
Your response to that girl was utterly fantastic and brilliant.
America commemorates many days. Very many days. Almost every other day is some commemoration holiday or parade in America. They are wealthy, so they party a lot...
(i.e. so we too should celebrate earth day, African American month, veterans day etc etc...)
If you are a flaming liberal, then go ahead a celebrate earth day. (We have Tu B'Shvat, almost the same thing, but without destroy big business bit) If you are black, then go ahead an celebrate (educate your family) on black history month. If you or your family member(s) are US veterans, then I see no problem giving tribute to American vetetans. Had it not been for these veterans, we wouldn't been living in this wonderful country.
I really don't see why we need to criticize or demean special days in America, or criticize those who choose to celebrate them.
FrumSkeptic: very good post, I liked how you were able to think of such a good response so quick, that's really true.
The thing about Holiday's is, that your not allowed to add on to what is already there, you can't create your own holiday and make it an every year thing. That's what the issue is with Thanksgiving and other American holiday's. Their not wrong on a religious level, cause their not a Christian holiday. However, there's an issue of not adding on to the Torah and what's already there. So you can have turkey, you can celebrate Mothers day and July 4th or any other of those. But it shouldn't become a ritual Holiday kinda thing.
FrumSkeptic: I heard that too, about the birthdays. Actually I recently heard that you should be giving Brachos on a birthday. But many people still have birthday parties and stuff, I think its a select Machmir few that don't believe in Birthday parties.
"that your not allowed to add on to what is already there"
a huge percentage of our "rituals" were added on. I'm only going to mention the "stupid" ones...
How many people eat "dates" on Rosh Hoshanah?
What about eating Jelly Donuts on Chanukah? It represents what it represents, but its man-made...and 100% added onto the Torah we already have.
But I mean to set aside a Holiday. Its a bigger thing then just what we choose to eat. Cause Hashem never told us exact foods we could or can not eat on certain days. Except Pesach we can't eat chometz, and that's part of Pesach.
But I mean it goes with the idea of Adam with Eitz hadas, that he added on to what Hashem said, he said to Chava that she can't touch the tree. So same kinda idea. You can't add on to what Hashem said and create new Holidays for everyone to keep.
Although later on they did add on days when we should mourn and stuff because a lot of people were killed, but that was either still in the time of the Rishonim or Achronim. Or if it was later on when the sanhadren had no power then they could make a day of mourning but it wouldn't become a mandatory universal thing for all generations to come.
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