THANKSGIVING

  

One thinks of Thanksgiving as an American holiday, a day when people give thanks to God with feasting and prayer for the blessings they have received during the year.  This is yet another Law, taken from the Torah that Christians and Jews alike follow. (Lev. 23:33) 

The first New England Thanksgiving was celebrated less than a year after the Plymouth colonists had settled in the new world. The first winter had killed nearly half of the settlers, but new hope grew in the fall of 1621 when the corn crop harvest was plentiful. There was so much cause for rejoicing; the Governor decreed that a three-day feast be held.  

The Indians brought wild turkeys and venison, and the men of the colony brought geese, ducks, and fish. The women of the colony made corn bread with nuts and succotash.  This first Thanksgiving was a "harvest festival," celebrating and thanking God for plentiful crops. Celebrating the fall harvest is now held in many lands throughout the world.  

This event actually started and took place more than 3,000 years ago after the crops were gathered and brought to the Temple in Jerusalem for prayer and thanking God for such a great harvest.  

This Jewish holiday was and still is called Sukkot (Succot), a holiday which celebrates the exile from Egypt in which our people lived in shacks made from palm leaves and also the Fall harvest which fed the Israelites. The Festival of Sukkot begins on the 15th day of the Hebrew month of Tishri, the fifth day after Yom Kippur. 

This Festival is sometimes referred to as Zeman Simkhateinu, the Season of our Rejoicing, which lasts for seven days. Sukkot has a dual significance: historical and agricultural.  This is also a holiday of hospitality, giving importance and concern of giving shelter to the homeless and food to the poor.  No one goes hungry during these days of Sukkot. All they have to do is to seek out a Jewish family. 

I wonder how many churches during Thanksgiving will tell their congregation that they are actually following Torah and observing a Jewish holiday.

 


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