CAN JEWS CELEBRATE CHRISTMAS?

Rabbi Ruven AI speaking here. Absolutely not. It is 100% forbidden for a Jew to celebrate Christmas in any way. This is not just a suggestion. It is a complete prohibition. Christmas is pure, idolatry, and celebrating it is against the Torah. Sometimes we say certain things in Shim that uh you know, more or less our standard Judaism. You know, I know that to some people it seems like we're providing such uh glorious new insights to the world, but really any normal Jew that has been learning throughout his life and just seeing what the basics of Judaism are would say, "Listen, this is basics." Many of my friends that are they they learn some of our they say, "Listen, sometimes there are things that are new insights, but he said, "You know what? It's always good to also review the basics as well to be reminded of the basics to to get a mousar perspective of the basics and so on. But the uh the truth is is that sometimes we'll provide something that's so basic, it's mind-boggling how shocked people get from it. It's mindboggling. Like for example, when uh I uh brought years ago the uh and we actually just republished a clip again today about the fact that the uh having a tree in your house, you know, in celebration of their uh the Christian holiday is 100% idolatry. And unfortunately, this has penetrated the Jewish world over the last several decades. Uh where more and more Jews are having a competition with the Christians or sometimes not even a competition, they're simply wanting to adopt the Christian idolatry faith uh by having a what they call a holiday tree, a holiday tree in their house. And uh despite the fact that the prophet Jeremiah, Yeshua Benoon, and many other places in the Torah specifically talk about how it's forbidden to have this ashoot tree as uh you know in the house, especially with all of the bells and whistles on it and so on. This is 100% benefiting from uh from idolatry. It's it's something that's ugly in the eyes of Hashem and so on and so forth. But the point being is that every time we uh you know reshare that video throughout the years and people are just flabbergasted. Oh, I can't believe it. My friend has one. Oh, I can't believe it. My cousin has one. Oh, I can't believe it. I I just saw it somewhere else. Uh what do I do? And what do you mean? What do you do? This is Get this out of your house. Get this this garbage out of your house. What do you you want to be uh close to Hashem? want to be close to uh idolatry. What do you want? No, but maybe there's maybe you're more strict. Maybe somebody else has different view on it. Maybe that's just your opinion. And then you know they in the beginning they say, "Oh, can you give me a source?" You give them a source. No, but maybe that's just your interpretation. They start creating all this excuses of why why why excuses? You asked me for a source. You asked me for an answer. I provided you an answer, but you now are fighting it. You don't want the answer. You don't like the answer that you got. The same exact thing happens every year with uh Thanksgiving. Every year for the last several years, Hashem, we've talked very strongly each year providing new information about why Jews celebrating Thanksgiving is not a good thing at all. And that's in the best case scenario. in a uh more likely scenario, it's 100% forbidden as adding to the Torah and many other sins. And then you would have you would think, oh, thank God, somebody's speaking against it. Thank God, you know, it's a uh somebody's at least not adopting these uh you know, gentile holidays into our faith. Uh you would think people would celebrate it. Of course, some people do, many people do. But then you have yourself these uh modern orthodox usually are the problematic ones that they come and start arguing. No, but really what Mosha Feinstein said that you said he didn't really say it like you said it and he really mean it like you mean it and so on and then they battle and they battle you. And a question I always ask myself, I always ask myself with all of these people that they fight, you know, whether it's the Thanksgiving argument or the uh Christmas argument or the wigs argument or or all the other things that we bring in which are all literally basics basics of Judaism, but they argue it with such passion and they, you know, hound you with all types. I asked myself, do you fight this hard for Torah? Like, do you fight this hard to enjoy Roshashana? Do you fight this hard to sanctify? Do you fight this hard to make peshim to make sure that all of your friends are both circumcised in their uh in their as well as in their hearts by the time they arrive at? and you don't have any of the garbage that's in many places on your sid table. Do you have do you fight so much? Do you fight so much for for Shabbat? Or do you invite all your friends that Shabbat knowing they're going to drive to your house week after week, week after week? No. No. He's a you he's a he's a captured baby. 30 years he's captured and you're keeping him captured. That's what you you know that's the thing. It's like if you're already going to fight for something, at least fight for the truth. At least fight like an honest person. But unfortunately, some people, they want to fight to stay idol worshippers. They want to fight to stay heretics. They want to fight to stay the way they are. They do not want to change. They don't want to change. And in this time of year when there's so much tuma coming from this idolatry and from all of the mistakes that are happening and all of this garbage that's happening, it's very important for a person to know what does Hashem think about all of this? What does Hashem think about all of this? Now there's a puk in the book of Isaiah in a chapter 43 verse 22 where Isaiah says in the name of translation but you did not call out to me oh Jacob referring to is of course for you grew wary of me oh is so here rebukes the people rebukes for forsaking his services replacing it with idolatry now what does it have to do with us we go into the midlash Inal we see a heartbreaking midash explanation of what is really being told here what is really happening here and I'm afraid to tell you that if we do not Stop honoring the gentile ways, the noahhide ways more than what we do our own Jewish religion, obligation, lifestyle, culture, customs and so on. If we continue to wanting to be like the goim, wanting to be like the nations, it won't end so well. The prophet Isaiah was at a time towards the uh uh the first beta mikdash and he's rebuking is in the name of forsaking him and going to idolatry and the mid says what is really the meaning of this verse? What is the meaning of this verse? So they bring some uh parables and explanations. parable to explain this verse says the son of said the holy one and blessed is he said my children did not even treat me like this lupin which is served at the end of a meal what's a lupin the says that a lupin is a round bitter tasting bean that is so bitter it has to be boiled seven times until it becomes sweet and it's used typically as like a dessert. It's never a uh main dish or anything like that but it's uh so bitter you have to boil it seven times. And in essence the is saying here that is this bean and he's saying to is you're treating me like this bean this lupin bean this why this kim what's the difference what's the what's the connection says that you are look at what you did to me look at what you did to me. We go to the book of Judges, chapter 10, verse number six. The children of Israel continued to do that which was evil in the eyes of Hashem. And they worshiped the Baleim, the Asherot, the gods of Aram, the gods of Sidon, the gods of Morav, the gods of the children of Ammon, and the gods of the Philistine, and they forsook Hashem, and they did not serve him. See here the verse attesting that is not only turned away from God to worship idols. But worse yet they actually served the idols and were more excited about thanksgiving were more excited about exm were more excited about the news and sports and everything the opposite of Torah than even the were. They're more excited about the goim lifestyle than than even the goim were. And they ended up serving the idols more passionately than even the goim. As it says in the book of Kings, Kings 1, chapter 18 verse number 26, they took the bull that he gave them and prepared it and called out in the name of the Bal from morning until noon, saying, "Oh Bal, answer us." Comes the in the mid says, "Look at that. These idol worshippers, look what they do. They served their bal once. What did you do? You served this bal. You served this idol morning till noon. Even longer than the yum kipu all the way from to go fight to go fight the truth. You went and you prayed all day. Go bal answer us. O bal answer us all day from morning until noon. You serve the idols even more than the goim do. When you go there, when you go that route and says, "Look at this. Not only did you serve them, but you served them even more passionately than you than the goim served them. But not even that. That wasn't even the part that was the worst part. If you're already going to serve these seven idols, why don't you at least include me in it, too?" law of duty even with partnership meaning even on top of these other idols. Okay, you want to go worship an idol and your seven idols. You want to go, you know, football, baseball, NBA, MLB, uh Christmas, idol, the uh the the wigs, the the Thanksgiving, the money, chasing money your whole life, Wall Street, all all that stuff. You want to serve all the Okay. At the very least, At the very least, be as passionate about my The next time Yumipu comes up, don't say. THE NEXT TIME PES COMES, DON'T SAY, "Oh man, why don't you at the very least serve me that same excitement like you are for Thanksgiving? Same excitement that you have for the shopping season, same excitement that you have for the Super Bowl." Boo says, "Look at that. Not only did they cheat on me, but they actually are more excited about the other stuff and they don't even include me. That's why I'm a lupin. That's why I'm like a lupin. Why a lupin? Because look at that. The lupin. Look how hard it is. Look how hard it works. Seven times you have to boil it just to finally just to finally make it sweet. Says I'm like this lupin. I'm like this. I'm like this lup. Look at this. They went and said seven idols just like the boil thing seven times. But they still only use me as a dessert. It's still like at the end barely don't give me any respect. They don't care about nothing. This is mam crying to us at times like this when has holiday trees and is excited about buying new stupid iPhones and new cars and everything else. You ask a person, listen, why don't you come to oh you know the corona I don't want to get infected you know there's a lot of people yeah but you tell the guy listen why don't you come and uh you know go to a uh a meeting maybe you could potentially find a client and sell a house sell a building sell a business oh yeah sure you don't even ask who's going to be there you don't even ask who's going to be there why don't you go vote vote there's 50 zillion people over there voting for the 87th time yeah no problem going. I'm going to vote. I'm make sure my vote counts. My vote counts. It doesn't make a difference if it counts. This is a rebuke of all rebukes. This is crying to us at times like this. It breaks my heart to give you this message, but it's just it's sickening already. seeing how excited the certain Jews and especially ones that call themselves religious, especially ones that call themselves religious, how excited they are about everything not Jewish. And some of the examples that I gave you already there. Some other examples are like these horrible articles and pictures that are published every year on the internet about look a kaba just found finds another Jew that's dressed like Santa Claus or today some uh some news outlet published an article there's one modern orthodox Jew that's been dressing up as Santa Claus for I don't know a few decades. What a what a disgrace. What a disaster we're in. You're celebrating Christmas. You're celebrating. No, no, I'm not celebrating it. Just my I'm making a living out of it. What? There's no other jobs in the world for you. You have to be Santa Claus. There's nothing else for you to do in the world. There's no other time that you could take a picture of a person putting on to fillin. You have to put on to fillain when he's dressed up like Santa Claus or like Buddha or any of these other jokesters. This is what we are. This is the level that we're in now. And then we're expecting to bring us a cure without killing us to this Corona virus and all this disaster. It's it's it's it breaks my heart to give messages like this. But it just has to be said. It has to be said by somebody. We are meant to be a light unto the nations, not to follow their misguided practices. [music] Remember, every Jew has to remember that he's a Jew and she's a Jew. We don't celebrate non-Jewish holidays, even if they seem harmless. It's [music] ail disrespect to the Torah.