By Valerie Macon
Most of us are familiar with how the masses celebrate Christmas. Fewer are familiar with other holidays and observances that are celebrated during this busy season that runs from November through January. Let’s take a look at the origins and traditions of not only Christmas, but of Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Chinese New Year and Native American Heritage Month.
Christmas
Christmas is a Christian holiday celebrated on December 25 that commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ. Literally, the word Christmas means the mass (celebration) of Christ (Christ is the Hebrew word for Messiah). Although Christmas has become highly commercialized, Christians still find meaning in many of the traditions of the season.
Gift giving at Christmas is a reminder of the gifts the wise men brought to Jesus at his birth. It is also a reminder of Christ’s gift to humanity, the gift of new life and salvation. Many not only give gifts to family and friends, but to the poor and those in need. Santa Claus, a merry Christmas icon whose generosity is demonstrated through giving presents, originated with Saint Nicholas, who, in fact, gave gifts to the poor.
The tradition of decorating a Christmas tree has become part of the celebration and has symbolic meaning related to the Christmas story. The Christmas tree is an evergreen, which symbolizes everlasting life. The star or angel placed at the top of the tree represents the star that led the wise men to Jesus at his birth or the angel that spoke to Mary about the birth of Jesus. The lights on the tree represent Christ as the light of the world.
During the Christmas season, people embellish their homes with elaborate light displays and all manner of holiday decorations, sing Christmas carols, send Christmas greetings, attend Christmas parties, watch Christmas parades, celebrate with family and friends, exchange gifts, recount the Christmas story, and attend church. For Christians, Christmas is a reminder of God’s goodness and His compassion and love for mankind.
For local resident Elina Pelikan, Christmas begins with a Christmas Eve service and a feast where favorite foods are served and gifts exchanged. The next 12 days are spent opening presents and stockings. Her children perform in various Christmas shows. New Year’s Eve is spent with friends and there is always a St. Basil Cake with a coin baked into it; whoever gets the coin in their piece gets an extra blessing. She says: “This is a time to sing and celebrate with family, to make memories and show love.”
Mary Shelton relates the unique perspective of growing up a child of deaf parents. As such, there was no singing Christmas carols or listening to Christmas music, but her parents overcompensated with lavish decorations. She recalls: “We had more twinkling lights and manger scenes than should be allowed in any suburban household.” She says: “Reflecting on my childhood, Christmas smells were probably a thing, too. My mother did tend to bake quite a few aromatic things during Christmas.”
Hanukkah
Hanukkah is a Jewish holiday, often referred to as the “Festival of Lights.” Hanukkah is celebrated for eight days and nights, starting on the 25th of the Jewish month of Kislev, which this year falls on December 18-26 on the secular calendar.
The Hanukkah story is based on historical events that took place in 165 BCE in Jerusalem. After the Second Temple in Jerusalem was desecrated by Emperor Antiochus IV and his Syrian-Greek troops, the Jewish priest, Mattathias, and his five sons led a rebellion that eventually went on to defeat the Greeks and reclaim the Temple in Jerusalem. When they attempted to light the holy lamp (the menorah) for the rededication of the Temple, they found only enough holy oil for one night. Miraculously, the one-day supply of oil lasted for eight days.
Every year, families and communities commemorate these miracles. Although each community has unique Hanukkah traditions, there are some traditions that are universally practiced. For eight nights, in households and in synagogues, special blessings are sung or recited in Hebrew before lighting a candle on the menorah–a candelabra with eight branches plus a central candle, the shamash, which is used to light the other eight candles.
Many families serve special holiday foods. It is a custom to eat foods fried in olive oil to commemorate the miracle of the small flask of oil keeping the Temple menorah lit for eight days. They sing songs, play games, and exchange gifts. Some Hasidic and Sephardi Jews recite Psalms.
The following are recollections of Holly Springs resident Steven Roberts:
“As a Jewish kid in a small town in the Hudson Valley in New York, I was in the minority. There’s an inherent challenge to parents of Jewish kids when not in a Jewish community at Christmas time. His name is Santa Claus.
The tightrope is to not celebrate Christmas, while telling your kids not to tell all the other kids that Santa doesn’t exist. I don’t remember exactly how my parents finagled it, but I do know that I wasn’t to blame for the shattered dreams for the non-existence of the North Pole, in a Kris Kringle sense. Once my friends were old enough to learn about the eight nights of Hanukkah translating into a minimum of eight gifts—one for each night—the questions started coming. That was certainly not the tradition in my house. There was one night of gifts; I received a couple of small gifts and, at times, one larger gift. In many households, there is a gift for each night, but that’s not always the case.
Although the photo I’m sharing shows wrapping paper on the gifts, I really don’t remember having wrapping paper. It was more common to use the Sunday comics, or more commonly, aluminum foil. I preferred the comics, as the aluminum foil was sometimes high-risk to slide your fingers across the seam.
There was never a Christmas tree in the house. I have wonderful memories of going to my friend Tim’s house to help him decorate his tree on a few occasions. Of course, I think I was the most excited one in the house to decorate. You so often want that which you can’t have.
We did have a Menorah, which was lit every night of Hanukkah, adding one candle per night, for each of the eight nights. At sundown the candles were lit, and a prayer was recited (or sung in our home) in Hebrew. I have never forgotten the prayer, and it’s a tradition that I still share with my kids today. The prayer translated is “Blessed are You, Adonai our God, Ruler of the Universe, who makes us holy with your commandments, commanding us to kindle (light) the Hanukkah lights.” There are two more prayers, but as a reformed Jewish household, we didn’t know or recite them.
We did not change our meals at Hanukkah. It was “business as usual” at mealtime. We had pancakes for breakfast and any one of Mom’s go-to dinners. (Were we the only ones that had chopped up hot dogs blended into some type of macaroni and cheese dish?)
As I mentioned, we were Reformed Jews. To understand that, one needs to understand that Jews are a people, not a religion. Growing up, I learned there are three main branches of Judaism, and that there are Jews that don’t practice Judaism at all (the religion). Orthodox Jews retain traditional Jewish laws and customs. Conservative Jews embrace more of the Western culture (clothing for example) but still closely follow traditional Judaism beliefs and actions. Reformed Jews are the most relaxed of the three. This is a branch that was formed to be more integrated into Western ways and societies. Even Reformed Jews have different levels of following Judaism, with some celebrating traditional weekly Sabbaths and others only celebrating the Jewish holidays. As more families find themselves in mixed-faith marriages, things can become even more relaxed. My home celebrates Easter, Passover, Hanukkah and Christmas. It has become more tradition than religion. Again, you don’t have to practice Judaism to be Jewish any more than you have to attend church if you are Christian.
I reached out to my brothers to get clarification on some of my memories of celebrating the holidays. It was half a century ago so my memory is a little fuzzy, and each of them had a different memory of how Christmas and Hanukkah were handled at our house. One brother thought we received a small gift at Christmas as a type of “hush money” to not let the Santa mystery out of the bag. My other two brothers have no memory of receiving Christmas gifts. Another brother expressed that we didn’t really broadcast that we were a Jewish family due to fear of anti-Semitism, something I don’t remember at that age (although I did experience it later in life).
Overall, I have fond memories of celebrating Hanukkah as a kid. My favorite two gifts I remember? An AM radio shaped like a ball, circa 1976. I remember sitting in a snow fort that my friends and I built, and hearing that the band KISS was coming to the civic center in Poughkeepsie. Tickets were $9.95. I also remember around 1975 receiving a friction-powered dump truck called a Mighty Mo. Advertising at its best. It was all I wanted that year, sold from the Saturday morning commercials during the best cartoon era of all time.”
Kwanzaa
Although Kwanzaa takes place during religious holidays, Kwanzaa is not a religious holiday, rather, a cultural holiday that honors and celebrates African heritage and African traditions. The holiday begins on December 26 and ends January 1. Kwanzaa is a relatively new holiday, created in America in 1966 by activist/scholar Maulana Karenga. After it was initially created in California, the holiday spread outside of the United States and is recognized and celebrated by people in Africa, Canada, England and the Caribbean. Any race can join in the celebration.
People who celebrate Kwanzaa avoid the chaos of holiday-season shopping, rejecting the consumer culture of other major December holidays. Instead, modest gifts are given, gifts which are often homemade, never expensive, and reflect the seven principles of the holiday. The Nguzo Saba, or the seven principles of African Heritage, are the focus, and each of the seven days of Kwanzaa is dedicated to one of the principles. These principles are: Umoja (unity), Kujichagulia (self-determination), Ujima (collective work and responsibility), Ujamaa (cooperative economics), Nia (purpose), Kuumba (creativity) and Imani (faith).
Seven symbols are associated with the holiday: fruits and nuts, placemats, ears of corn, candles, candle holders, communal cups and gifts. These symbols are arranged on a table on the first day of Kwanzaa. Each day of Kwanzaa, celebrants in the household gather around the ceremonial symbols and discuss the seven principles of the holiday. After this, poetry, music or dance is often enjoyed by those celebrating.
Kwanzaa has three symbolic holiday colors: Red, representing the struggles of the African people; green, hope and future; black, Earth and African people. The traditional Kwanzaa candle holder (the kinara) has three red and three green candles with a black candle in the center. A new candle is lit each of the seven days of the Kwanzaa holiday. These colors—red, green, and black—are also used in the traditional African garb during the season.
Chinese New Year
The year 2023 is The Year of the Water Rabbit. According to the Chinese Zodiac, The Year of the Rabbit comes once every 12 years and “it is a year that encourages long-term relationships in which emotional troubles are not common. It is a great year to strengthen and rebuild your relationships.”
The date of Chinese New Year is decided by the Chinese Lunar Calendar, which is based on cycles of the moon and sun. Although the date changes every year, it always falls between January 21 and February 20. This year, Chinese New Year’s Eve falls on January 21, 2023, and the Lantern Festival, which marks the end of New Year’s celebration, is on February 5, 2023.
Traditionally, for Chinese people, Chinese New Year, also called Spring Festival, lasts sixteen days and means family reunion, visiting relatives and honoring ancestors along with a host of traditions that include shopping for the Spring Festival, spring cleaning, writing and pasting spring couplets, setting off firecrackers, gathering for reunion dinners, staying up on New Year’s Eve, giving lucky money and going to the temple fair. People in China are given time off from work for a whole week to enjoy these traditions. However, in America, the celebration is condensed into one night of festivities.
Traditions vary among families, but the holiday remains important for many Chinese locals and immigrants in America. The Chinese New Year is an opportunity to pause busy lives and make time for loved ones, for family reunions and visiting relatives. This is the time for family members to get together over a meal, to play traditional Chinese games and to welcome in the new year together. For younger generations, it is a means of learning the traditions of their elders. In America, many Chinese elders play mahjong while waiting for the new year to begin. At midnight, people turn on their TVs and watch live broadcasts of firework displays.
The Chinese New Year symbolizes renewal and hope for a prosperous new year ahead. Perhaps most importantly, the holiday is an ideal time for Chinese American citizens to remember their Chinese culture and ancestry.
David Chang of Holly Springs, owner of China Uno Restaurant, relates how he celebrates Chinese New Year. He tells us that wherever you live, this is a time to return to your hometown to gather with family and celebrate. It is a time to eat chicken or duck and lots of goodies. It is time to wear your new clothes. The elders give “lucky money” in an envelope to the younger generation, which is thought to bring them good luck for the year. Most businesses close for a week, except for Chinese restaurants. Fresh flowers are given and received, representing good wishes for the new year.
Native American Heritage Month
On October 29, 2021, in honor of National American Indian Heritage Month (initiated by George H. W. Bush in 1990), Governor Roy Cooper proclaimed November as American Indian Heritage Month in North Carolina. Our state is home to the largest American Indian population east of
the Mississippi River. With more than 130,000 American Indians living in N.C., this represents the seventh largest population in the nation (2020 U.S. Census). North Carolina’s eight recognized tribes are the Coharie, Eastern Band of Cherokee, Haliwa-Saponi, Lumbee, Meherrin, Occaneechi Band of the Saponi Nation, Sappony, and Waccamaw-Siouan.
In North Carolina, honoring Native American heritage is a month-long celebration lasting throughout November.
Michelle Hunt, of Lumbee and Cherokee descent, tells us how and why she celebrates:
“For me, a small-town woman from Pembroke, N.C., home of the Lumbee Tribe, celebration or tradition means the homecoming of loved ones, the gathering of friends and family. The cooking, the smells of home! It means fellowship, singing, dancing, togetherness, sharing old stories of way-back-when and hopes for future generations.
My grandfather, my mother’s father, Mr. Fred Godwin, was a full-blooded Cherokee Indian. He served in World War II and passed away almost two years after I was born. So, from him, I, my older brother and older sister had Cherokee in our bloodline too, as well as Lumbee, I honored that with honoring him! Celebrations have changed over the years since my grandmother, Fred Godwin’s wife, passed away in 1999. Like most families, the older generation was the “glue” that held the family together. Our basic Sunday dinners stopped; time pretty much divided everyone out to move on with living.
One day when I start my own little family, I will teach my children how important it is to know where you come from, to always help your neighbor, and to be a voice for your heritage.”
As part of this year’s 27th annual American Indian Heritage Celebration, the North Carolina Museum of History in downtown Raleigh is having a virtual Education Day on Friday, November 18, as well as an in-person festival on Saturday, November 19, 2022. The event will include presentations, demonstrations, and performances that highlight artistic, scientific, historic and cultural contributions of American Indians in North Carolina. Museum resources also include videos-on-demand, where one can watch films from North Carolina’s state-recognized tribes.
A common thread runs through each of these holidays and celebrations. It is a time to pause, to reflect, to re-center, to honor and reaffirm our history, tradition and faith. This is the season that encourages us to gather with family and friends, enjoy a meal together and celebrate.
