There are many shocking things that amaze us every day. One such astonishing thing is religion that brings new stories to forefront always.
Who Are The Jews
Jews and Judaism are not all the same. Jewish scriptures and laws explain customs and ways of thinking. In the Iron Age, Jacob’s 12 sons started a religion called Judaism. It is a monotheistic religion based on the idea that there is only one, all-powerful God who told Moses and the Jewish people what to do. Faith isn’t always a part of Jewish life today, and it’s still a mix of being a people, having faith, and living a certain way.
Three times a year, Jews went on pilgrimages and made sacrifices at the Temple in Jerusalem. The leaders of the community were sent to Babylon in 586 BCE, and the first Temple was destroyed at the same time. Iraqi Jews think of themselves as the first group of people to move away from their home country.
In 70 CE, the Romans destroyed the second Temple. After that, many people moved away, but many stayed in Israel. Rabbinic Judaism grew after the second Temple was destroyed. Jewish customs, holidays, and theology were changed to fit a world without sacrifices and Temple worship. Jewish writings and learning continue to look at what Judaism means in the world and in the places where Jews live, building on what has been learned in the past.
During the time that the b were in charge of Judea, Jewish communities started to grow in Europe. The first Jews in Italy lived in Rome around 139 BCE. Italian Jews are the oldest in Europe. Around 2000 years ago, Jewish communities started to form in Europe. They were relatively wealthy, but they were also persecuted and oppressed, which would later be used as themes in Nazi antisemitism and in Holocaust denial and anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.
What Is Christmas And How Is It Celebrated
Christmas is a Christian holiday that celebrates Christ’s birth. In the Western Church, it is held every year on December 25. The date of December 25 has been used since the year 273 A.D. On that day, there were also two pagan festivals that honoured the sun. It is possible that December 25 was chosen to counteract the power of paganism.
Some people still don’t like Christmas because they think it’s tainted by the pagan holidays that were held on the same day. But Christians have believed for a long time that the gospel not only goes beyond culture, but also changes it.
In response to this criticism in the year 320, one theologian said, “We don’t celebrate this day as holy like the pagans do because the sun was born, but because he made it.”
How Christmas Eve Got Its Start
In some parts of the world, Christmas was celebrated for hundreds of years as a whole season, starting on this day, December 24, Christmas Eve.
Maybe the idea of having a party the night before the big day comes from the way ancient Jews counted. In the past, a day for Jews started at six in the evening and ended at six the next evening. Hadn’t Moses written, “The first day was an evening and a morning”?
“Christmas” is the name for Christmas. Even though the date is unknown, people have been celebrating it since at least the fourth century. Under the influence of the church, pagan solstice celebrations were replaced by Christian ones all over Europe.
Many of the more harmless pagan traditions, like bringing in a Yule log or decorating with holly, were taken over by Christians and given a new meaning.
Do Jews Have Christmas Celebrations
Christmas is not a religious holiday for Jewish people. This is because Christmas is a celebration of Jesus Christ’s birth, and both his birth and death are important parts of Christian theology and salvation.
The birth of Jesus Christ is not a religiously important event in Judaism, so there’s no reason to celebrate it. Some Jews who live in parts of the world where Christmas is a time for parties and celebrations might have a Christmas tree or do other things that are usually associated with Christmas.
If there are Christians in a Jew’s immediate family, that Jew might go to or host a Christmas party. This could include Jews who are married to Christians or who grew up in homes where both their Jewish and Christian backgrounds were honoured. In this case, Christmas is often a time for family to get together and share happy memories. It is not a religious holiday.
Christmas and Hanukkah, a Jewish holiday, sometimes fall on the same day. Hanukkah is a minor Jewish holiday, not as important as Passover or Yom Kippur. It lasts for eight nights and celebrates the historic victory of the Jewish Maccabees over the Greek-Syrian empire of the time, which allowed the Temple in Jerusalem to be reclaimed and rededicated.
What Is Hanukkah
Hanukkah is celebrated by saying special prayers and lighting candles in public each night in a special candelabra called a hanukkiah (sometimes referred to as a menorah). In many places, Jews celebrate Hanukkah with traditions that are similar to some of the ways Christians celebrate Christmas. For example, they give gifts and decorate their homes with wreaths or bells. Hanukkah is usually celebrated in December (though sometimes it can be at the end of November).
This means that in places where people celebrate Christmas in public, Hanukkah is often celebrated in public as well, and is sometimes called “the Jewish Christmas” by people who aren’t Jewish.
In the past, Jews who lived in countries where they were persecuted by the majority population sometimes had a hard time during the Christmas season. Because of this, some Jewish traditions grew up around Christmas as a way to keep Jews safe. Some of these rules are to stay home all night and not do anything Jewish that might make other people angry.
