An old friend of mine, Rabbi Richard Hammerman, and his wife, Sharon, are in Israel for a few weeks to spend time with their twin granddaughters in year programs, and to see Richard’s brother and family, as well as other friends like myself, friends for over half a century. Hammerman was a very spiritual Conservative rabbi during his half-century of active pulpit work and was an innovator of many distinctive projects.
I want to share his thoughts on Purim.
“Jocularly, folks sometimes say, ‘Purim is like Yom Kippur; ‘Yom K’Purim,’” he begins. “Sadly, from my American perspective, the current (and longtime) political leadership in both the US and Israel leads me to say: ‘Our American and Israel political leaders need to make Purim into Yom Kippur – a serious day of atonement.’”
Hammerman continues: “For the rest of us, we do need a ‘day off’ from the daily onslaught of bad news. Let’s celebrate our victories against our ever-present enemies in times past and today. As I have been privileged to do so in the US and Israel, let us heed Mordechai’s dictum: to transform these days from grief and mourning to days of feasting and merrymaking, sending gifts to one another and presents to the poor.”
With everything transpiring, I continue to live in the past, recalling my early celebration of Purim. Annually, back in the 1940s in Atlanta, Georgia, we knew that Purim was the commemoration of the near-destruction of the Jews but was sadly opposite to the destruction of the Jews in the Holocaust. We were taught over and over in Hebrew school – no “day schools” yet – that the Jews of Persia were only saved by the strength of character of Queen Esther, our exceptional predecessor. There was no sexism about Purim – Esther rose to the fore with those moving words: “If I perish, I perish.”
We sang with gusto, “Esther was the lovely queen,” and the girls back then were all dressed as queens. None of us, however, filled the streets of the famed “Southside,” where a goodly number of the city’s 40,000 Jews lived. Observing and enjoying Jewish faith and fun was done indoors.
Quickly, we learned the traditional song “Once there was a wicked, wicked man and Haman was his name, sir; He would have murdered all the Jews, but they were not to blame, sir.” The present-day Haman is moving fast to destroy us again, but an and thus to assure the safety of Israel. By the time my words are revealed, we will see what the president of the USA has done.
Groggers, Hamans, and hamantashen
At my synagogue, Shearith Israel, friends and I had a wonderful time coming in costume for the large party on a Sunday before Purim. Parents watched joyfully as their kids danced excitedly. There was a professional dance teacher in our synagogue who worked up a “Purim Square Dance,” in which we did “Esther and Mordechai” formations instead of the typical do-si-do.
The Grogger Banging and Twirling contest filled the “vestry” room to the ceiling with “noise, noise, and more noise.” I never used my unusual noisemaker in the contest. Maybe I would have won, and maybe not. My personal grogger was much larger than all the others and was made by my grandfather, Cathriel Birshtein of blessed memory, for his little girl and my mother, Anna. That grogger exploded with an ear-splitting sound, an imitation of thunder, so I was never allowed to use it. My parents did not want to pay for any burst eardrums.
In Atlanta, there were multifaceted celebrations of Purim held and a variety of hamantaschen to devour. Noted producer for CBS’s 60 Minutes and winner of many Emmys and the Edward R. Murrow Award, Henry Schuster, who grew up in Atlanta, wrote an article about it.
“Let’s get something straight about Purim,” he wrote. “I’m a chocolate hamantaschen guy. Raspberry sure, but chocolate and raspberry even better. At our synagogue, in the ‘50s in Atlanta, the Purim carnival was an annual highlight. The carnival was always better than the costumes,” he stressed. “Sure, the toys were junky and most didn’t last more than a week or two, but it was the sugar rush felt in many forms filling the toys. And best of all, you got out of Hebrew school early.”
Unlike what transpires now, Schuster pointed out that “Purim wasn’t a booze fest at our synagogue then – or maybe I just didn’t realize it, being a kid. When my kids were in Boy Scouts, a Jewish troop then, we had a weekend trip to Charleston, South Carolina. We happened to be at one of the shuls on the evening of Purim, and all the boys were scandalized when they were personally welcomed by an extremely drunk rabbi during services” In some locales, temperance on Purim was still enforced. As Schuster emphasized, “He, the spiritual leader, put the grog in grogger.” Times have changed.
He then stressed a significant aspect of Purim: “As a child, you appreciate the toys, the costumes, the delicious hamantaschen made only once a year, and the chance to be noisy during a service without anyone saying ‘Be quiet.’ Of course, the shalah manot were filled with a variety of candies and sometimes even little toys.
“Only when you get older,” he stressed, “you realize how many Hamans are out there and how few Esthers and Mordechais.”
Three personal Esthers
All of us living in Israel experience our Purim in a different way. As Rabbi Sidney Greenberg stresses in describing us here, “We stand taller when we read of Mordechai, who would not bow down or kneel before Haman. Here was this prime minister, next to the king, the most powerful representative of a most powerful empire, before whom all bowed in submissive obeisance. One person alone, Mordechai, denies him adoration.”
Greenberg in his wisdom wants all of us to learn more from our Purim holiday. “The Purim story has taught all of us how inextricably the destiny of the individual Jew is intertwined with the fate of all Jews. Here, Haman was offended by a single person, Mordechai.” Then the rabbi’s message becomes stronger.
“But when Haman learns that Mordechai is a Jew, the megillah tells us, ‘it seems contemptible in his eyes to lay hands on Mordechai alone’… Wherefore Haman sought to destroy all the Jews who were throughout the whole kingdom of Ahasuerus.” A single Jew pricks his pride, and Haman is ready to destroy them all.
How proud I was of Esther when I was growing up. I had three personal examples. My mother, Anna, was the first asked to be involved when a new project of a Jewish nature was being undertaken. My paternal grandmother, Sara Hene Geffen, founded a sisterhood for the synagogue, and in 1918 she led women in the synagogue, who contributed ten cents up to $10 to buy a sefer Torah for the synagogue.
Then there was Frieda Birshtein, my mother’s mother, a noted dispenser of tzedakah; all the traveling men visited her for contributions. Most noted for me, she bought me a new “stripped-down Chevy” when I was 16.
So here I am, 48 Purims after making aliyah. Am I frightened about Iran attacking? My fellow Israelis: The IDF has protected me through six wars; the military women and men will come through this time. Purim sameach!