Waiting inside the mall at Columbus circle for a friend whose last name used to be something along the lines of Schtupnicker, or Rabinowitz, I couldn't help but feel like I was missing out. Grand Christmas compositions filled the chamber, songs synchronized to a light show of dazzling white, blue and golden. The building shook with Christmas glory. in excelsis Deo.
This makes it very clear to me why there are more Mormons on the planet than Jews.
vs.
The solstice holiday during the darkest days of the year functions to warm and enliven the masses. Christmas celebrates the birthday of the Christ child, the embodiment of God on earth, who died for the sins of humanity, lifting the affliction of original sin. Hanukkah celebrates some antagonistic Jews having enough oil to last eight days, so they didn’t have to go out and buy more.
Christmas marks the miracle of the birth of messiah conceived immaculately.* For Jews, the eight days of oil for a one day's worth is the miracle. And, c'mon on, that really does count as a miraculous savings-- I mean eight days for one! The savings!
The songs that celebrate the birth of Christ are moving, uplifting, and haunting. Carols such as 'Silent Night,' 'Do You Hear What I Here' ‘Angels We Have Heard On High.' Truly beautiful, inspired works of music requiring a technicality of the voice only a gentile could produce.
What do Jews have? /Dreidel, dreidel, dreidel/ I made you out of clay/ When you're dry and ready, dreidels we will play/ There's not even a second verse. Maybe you could make a dreidel out of schmaltz instead. But schmaltz doesn't even rhyme with anything! That's it. Three lyrics to the most popular song. The only other big hit harps back ‘on the miracle of the oil,’ touting the deliciousness of latkes, which aren’t even as good as hash browns, and are sure to inspire indigestion, setting off a truly invigorating bout of kvetching. At least with the complaining, there will be something to talk besides the savings.
Christians eat and drink marvelous things for Christmas: mulled wine, apple cider, fruit cake, chocolate logs! On Hannukah, breaking out a traditional Jewish drink, Manishewitz, actually qualifies as a punishment.
On Christmas you can make out with people under mistletoe, wait for Santa Claus to come down your chimney-- truly a greater miracle than the oil savings-- watch It's A Wonder Life or Alfie shoot his eye out. On Hannukah, you’re back to your driedel, where the point of the game is winning gelt symbolic Jew gold) by shiesting your friends and family. The quality of chocolate in the gelt is akin to eating Hershey’s syrup on cardboard cutouts so heavily wrapped in foil, you'd imagine someone is trying to save a little money.
And what could be more Christmas than the centerpiece tree itself: the vestigial pagan phallus, celebrating fertility and life near the winter solstice, perfect for placing gifts around, bejeweling it in splendid adornments, angels, and fake snow to match the piney refreshment. On Hannukah, Jews break the menorah out, crusted in decades of wax and the accumulated dirt, so that we can relive the savings our ancestors enjoyed two thousand years ago. And where Jews take solace and warmth in the final light of their eight candles, Christians stream their homes in decorative luminescence, outlining their abodes in color and festivity! The institution of Christmas lights has been boon for college kids for centuries, though Jews probably innovated the blue ones.
Ah, Christmas, what a wonderful holiday.
You'd have to nail me to a cross to get me to convert, but until the mob carries me away, I'll be singing 'Rudolph the Red-nosed Reinder', a song all Semites can relate to.
*Immaculate conception: When Mary got knocked up by God, it was so clean she didn’t have to waddle off to the bathroom for a jizz rag to clean herself up. Amirite guys?
