Q: What is your opinion about celebrating the holiday of Thanksgiving tonight with a turkey dinner?
A:
Thanksgiving is a holiday that was manufactured by gentiles for the purpose of going to church. That’s what the original purpose was. And therefore it’s avoda zara and Jews are forbidden to participate in such a thing. If you eat turkey especially for Thanksgiving, you’re an oveid avoda zara. That’s my opinion.
Now, some people are weak in this matter; but I think it’s real avoda zara; I think it’s יהרג ואל יעבור. I think a Jew shouldn’t eat turkey on Thanksgiving at all! He should make a sacrifice not to eat turkey. Because it’s a Christian observance you understand. It’s not a legal holiday alone. It’s only recently that it became a ‘legal holiday.’ But it used to be a Christian holiday and that’s what it is, all the way down till today.
However, like I told you earlier there’s somebody who permits it, and even though I say it’s all wrong, I’m not going to force my opinion on you. But if anybody in my synagogue would ask me such a question, I would give it to him. But since you’re not in my synagogue, so I’ll let you go.
TAPE # R-30 (November 1972)
Q:
Is it OK to go to a Thanksgiving party if we won’t eat turkey?
A:
And the answer is it’s like going to a X-mas party even though you won’t dance around the tree. Same thing.
If somebody invites you to such a party, thank them but tell them that you’re sorry but you already have a previous engagement. You have a bar mitzvah that day.
TAPE # 434 (November 1982)
Q:
The Rav said that we have to honor our parents and we should extend that honor to the oldest brother and even to the younger brothers. Being that today is the secular holiday of Thanksgiving, how do we handle this “honoring” when they invite us to celebrate this particular holiday with them?
A:
Suppose a person has a relative who invites him to a feast of ham sandwiches—
Q:
No, no. I’m talking about a kosher meal—
A:
And I’m talking about ham sandwiches! What would you do? You know what to do! So when he invites you to a feast of Thanksgiving it’s exactly the same thing. Now you know what to do.
TAPE # 853 (November 1992)
Toras Avigdor
Brooklyn, NY 11204
There is more than one ‘somebody who permits it’ and similar days, ranging from the Rishonim to contemporary Acharonim, including of course Rav Moshe Feinstein ztl. https://ohr.edu/6105
@slz –
1 Thanksgiving did not exist in the days of the Rishonim.
2 Rav Hutner zt”l said, being tied to the calendar makes it “abizraihu d’avodah zara.
3 Rav Yosef Ber Soloveichik zt”l of RIETS did not, I believe, permit outright.
4 I am quite certain that Rav Moshe zt”l did not unconditionally permit; only under certain conditions.
5 The most important point, by far, is that The Pilgrims -Puritans – were actually celebrating their freedom from the oppressive Church of England and their “right” to create their own oppressive colonies where synagogues were not legal and where members of other religions were not at all free to practice. IF citizens of the US wish to celebrate their freedom and thank the A-almighty for their country of residence it would seem July 4th is far more appropriate.