It’s a Christian holiday (“hallowed evening – the night before “all saints day”). The fact that is includes pre-Christian (“pagan”) elements is hardly a heter. It is mamash avodah zarah.
Now Thanksgiving, or Independence Day, or Columbus Day — those are more interesting shailohs.
Pagan is also avoda zora.
Bmichilas kvod harav the main question seems to have been glossed over.There never was a question if H-day originated from idolatry, rather did it lose its connection in peoples minds and is it now just an American kids holiday.It is virtually nonexistent in England, where it probably originated,as well as many other countries.The secular date, for example, which used to be steeped in Christianity, is generally considered muttar to use today.On the other hand, many do stick to this holiday’s Christian meaning and I do believe many churches have special services on this day.So the question remains does the level of bittul of the religious aspect of this holiday qualify to consider it a secular one at least to the level of someone only doing it for fun is not definitely violating idolatry.This would also make a difference in level of tochachah when telling someone not to be involved.If that person is on a lower level of observance, may not listen to you and if this is not a clear violation, maybe reproof is unnecessary.The term “having to be careful” is not clear enough for a day that halachically lies somewhere in between Thanksgiving and December 25.
Addendum:It would seem that the general American culture has removed the Christian aspect of this Holiday.This can be seen from the fact that none of the items sold for this day have religious meaning.They are all meant for fun,albeit gory.When I lived in Chicago,all the sports teams there were an exercise in futility.Someone on my block put up fake gravestones ,each with the name of another Chicago team on it.Crazy,not halachically idolatry.Furthermore,I don’t believe the church fights back against the secularization of October 31.However, despite much secularization of December 25, many items sold for that day have religious/idolatrous meaning and the church definitely tries to fight back against the secularization of that day.I am not paskening as to if that makes a halachically difference and I certainly have a dee
Continuation- deep aversion to this day (both because of it being disgusting and the anti Semitism it,at least used to, bring out). However I do think that could figure in a discussion about the virtual of the avodah zarah aspect.
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It’s a Christian holiday (“hallowed evening – the night before “all saints day”). The fact that is includes pre-Christian (“pagan”) elements is hardly a heter. It is mamash avodah zarah.
Now Thanksgiving, or Independence Day, or Columbus Day — those are more interesting shailohs.
Pagan is also avoda zora.
Bmichilas kvod harav the main question seems to have been glossed over.There never was a question if H-day originated from idolatry, rather did it lose its connection in peoples minds and is it now just an American kids holiday.It is virtually nonexistent in England, where it probably originated,as well as many other countries.The secular date, for example, which used to be steeped in Christianity, is generally considered muttar to use today.On the other hand, many do stick to this holiday’s Christian meaning and I do believe many churches have special services on this day.So the question remains does the level of bittul of the religious aspect of this holiday qualify to consider it a secular one at least to the level of someone only doing it for fun is not definitely violating idolatry.This would also make a difference in level of tochachah when telling someone not to be involved.If that person is on a lower level of observance, may not listen to you and if this is not a clear violation, maybe reproof is unnecessary.The term “having to be careful” is not clear enough for a day that halachically lies somewhere in between Thanksgiving and December 25.
Addendum:It would seem that the general American culture has removed the Christian aspect of this Holiday.This can be seen from the fact that none of the items sold for this day have religious meaning.They are all meant for fun,albeit gory.When I lived in Chicago,all the sports teams there were an exercise in futility.Someone on my block put up fake gravestones ,each with the name of another Chicago team on it.Crazy,not halachically idolatry.Furthermore,I don’t believe the church fights back against the secularization of October 31.However, despite much secularization of December 25, many items sold for that day have religious/idolatrous meaning and the church definitely tries to fight back against the secularization of that day.I am not paskening as to if that makes a halachically difference and I certainly have a dee
Continuation- deep aversion to this day (both because of it being disgusting and the anti Semitism it,at least used to, bring out). However I do think that could figure in a discussion about the virtual of the avodah zarah aspect.
That last line was bittul of avodah zarah aspect.