Rav Miller zt’l
Q:
What would the Rav say that our attitude should be towards the holiday of Thanksgiving?
A:
Our attitude is the same as it is towards any other gentile religious festival. Because that’s what Thanksgiving is. Even though Thanksgiving is accepted by the government authorities as a legal holiday, nevertheless, it is a religious holiday. If you would bother to look into the encyclopedias, where the kosher gentiles are speaking, you would become aware of this. In the encyclopedias the kosher gentiles are speaking and you can accept their testimony. The gentiles themselves say that Thanksgiving is a religious holiday. And therefore it is אסור, it’s forbidden, for a Jew to do anything that would distinguish this day from any other day.
And to eat turkey, in my humble opinion, would be אביזרייהו דעבודה זרה, an ancillary transgression of actual idol worship, and is included in the דין of יהרג ואל יעבור. And that would mean that you must be willing to give up your life before celebrating Thanksgiving with a turkey dinner. A person should do anything rather than participate in celebrating Thanksgiving because it’s like celebrating any other gentile religious day.
TAPE #38 (November 1973)