(JTA) — Shortly after Thanksgiving, my children develop a refrain: “We have to start decorating for Hanukkah!” They pull out a plastic bin stuffed with decorations — some purchased at Target, others created at their Jewish day school — and transform our front window. They hang metallic dreidel cut outs along the frame. They press gel letters spelling “Happy Hanukkah” against the glass and move a credenza in front of it, arranging the menorahs on top, eagerly awaiting the first night’s candle-lighting.

It’s the kind of scene my grandparents would hardly recognize. Decorations were for Christmas, not Hanukkah. And in the late 1980s, when I was a child, there weren’t many Hanukkah decorations to buy, even if you had wanted them. Global manufacturing had not yet turned every holiday into an aisle of seasonal merchandise.

Some traditionalists might see these store-bought decorations and new customs as inauthentic or overly Americanized. But this doesn’t make my children’s version of Hanukkah “less authentic.” It is simply shaped by a different material and cultural world. Religion, after all, evolves with the people who practice it. My awareness of global, distinct Jewish traditions — whether from Israel, India, Morocco, Argentina or elsewhere — as well as my access to goods from around the world have allowed my family to expand our practices. As my children have grown, my family has experimented, borrowed and adapted. A holiday that once unfolded quietly around the kitchen table now spills out onto our windows and our social media feeds.

For some in the Jewish community, this kind of cultural adaptation reflects a worrying sign of assimilation while for others, a marker of renewed Jewish visibility. But this is not a sign of either decline or triumph. It is what religious life has always looked like — religious expression is continuously shaped by the shifting cultural contexts in which its practitioners live. And once we understand religion as something shaped by people, not simply imposed from above, it becomes clear why attempts to rigidly define it are so misguided.

This is especially true when it is political leaders who try to define what religion should be. Whether the claim comes from the far left, insisting that certain places are too sacred for politics, or from the far right, insisting that real Americanness requires a specific Christian expression, the instinct is the same: to fix religion – and religious expression – as rigidly defined.

The danger of trying to fix religion into a single, approved form is not abstract. When religious expression is narrowed — politically, culturally or physically — it becomes easier to mark some expressions as illegitimate, threatening or disposable. In moments like the shooting in Sydney, which targeted Jews publicly practicing Hanukkah, we see the deadly consequences of a world that struggles to tolerate visible religious difference.

In recent months we’ve seen statehouses mandate the display of the Ten Commandments, often framed through explicitly Christian interpretations, in public schools, while, on the left, some now contend that synagogues should bar certain political themes, reasoning that “sacred spaces” must not be used for events they view as morally or legally objectionable. These impulses differ politically, but they share a desire to police the sacred.

But that’s not how religion actually works. Religious communities are rarely politically neutral and they’re rarely politically uniform. They argue about values, practice, leadership, ethics and identity. They evolve. They absorb the cultures around them. Sometimes contributing and sometimes resisting. The result is not a single expression of religiosity, but a layered tapestry, vibrant and often contradictory. And this debate isn’t uniquely Jewish: Catholic parishes, Black churches, and Muslim communities, among others, are all wrestling with what belongs in their sacred spaces and who gets to decide.

And Hanukkah, of all holidays, should make us suspicious of neat categories. The Maccabees were zealots who not only fought imperial rule but also battled other Jews whom they viewed as insufficiently observant. Yet when Jews came to America, they retold the story of Hanukkah as one about religious freedom — of a small band of Jews, resisting an oppressive empire. The Jewish community in America elevated a once-minor holiday to a new cultural context.

Hanukkah’s evolution shows how religious traditions are shaped by the people who practice them, in the places where they take root, and through the cultural exchanges that surround them. This is precisely why attempts to rigidly define religion now threaten a core tenet of liberal democracy: religious pluralism.

This elasticity is not a weakness of religion. When politicians announce that houses of worship must be apolitical, they are projecting a sanitized ideal on communities that are always grappling with moral questions of their time. When others call on religious institutions to endorse candidates or crusade for partisan causes, they are treating religion as a tool rather than a living tradition.

In both cases, the beautiful variety of actual religious life  is at risk of being lost, threatened by a single official version that bears little resemblance to the lived reality of communities like mine. If we want a healthy democracy, we must resist efforts — from the left or right — to freeze religion into a single, approved form.

That’s why Hanukkah decorations in my window feel especially meaningful this year. They’re not a celebration of purity, or a symbol of moral certainty. They are a reminder of the centrality, and fragility, of religious pluralism to American public life.

Pluralism isn’t about keeping religion out of the public square, and it’s not about demanding that religion speak with one voice. It’s a recognition that healthy democracy depends on many traditions, stories, and forms of expression, none complete on their own. It’s a recognition that America is richer when different communities bring their customs into view, even if those customs evolve or look unfamiliar to previous generations.

When my children decorate our window, they are doing what children in every generation have done, creating and contributing to their tradition through the world they inhabit. And when the candles are lit for each night, they illuminate not a message of religious purity, but the possibility of a society where diverse practices and identities can coexist — messy, imperfect, real and not without risk. That, to me, is a miracle worth publicizing.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of JTA or its parent company, 70 Faces Media.

The post When my children decorate for Hanukkah, I don’t just see pride. I see pluralism in action. appeared first on The Forward.

United States President Donald J Trump in White House in Washington, DC, USA, on Thursday, December 18, 2025. Photo: Aaron Schwartz via Reuters Connect.

US President Donald Trump filed an appeal of a ruling by an Obama-appointed federal judge which restored $2.7 billion in public grants he had impounded from Harvard University over its alleged failure to address campus antisemitism along with other faults.

The move aims to put Harvard on the back foot,  as his efforts to penalize the institution have run into repeated legal roadblocks despite that virtually every other elite institution he has targeted for reform — such as Columbia University, Brown University, and Northwestern University — decided that settling with Trump is preferable to fighting the administration.

As previously reported, by The Algemeiner, US federal judge Allison Burroughs ruled in September that Trump acted unconstitutionally when he confiscated about $2.2 billion in Harvard University’s research grants, charging that he had used antisemitism as a smokescreen for a targeted, ideologically motivated assault on this country’s premier universities.” Burroughs went on to argue that the federal government violated Harvard’s free speech rights under the US Constitution’s First Amendment and that it was the job of courts to “ensure that important research is not improperly subjected to arbitrary and procedurally infirm grant terminations.”

The ruling conferred a major victory to Harvard, as it had been asked to grant to a wishlist of policy reforms that Republican lawmakers said would make higher education more meritocratic and less welcoming to anti-Zionists and far-left extremists. Contained in a letter the administration sent to Harvard president Alan Garber — who subsequently released it to the public — the policies called for “viewpoint diversity in hiring and admissions,” the “discontinuation of DEI initiatives,” and “reducing forms of governance bloat.” They also implored Harvard to begin “reforming programs with egregious records of antisemitism” and to recalibrate its approach to “student discipline.”

Harvard refused the president his wishes even after losing the money and took the issue to federal court. Meanwhile, it built a financial war chest, leveraging its GDP-sized assets to issue over $1 billion dollars in new debt and drawing on its substantial cash reserves to keep the lights on. It fought on even as it registered its largest budget deficit, $113 million, since the Covid-19 pandemic, according to The Harvard Crimson.

On Friday, Harvard told multiple outlets it is “confident that the Court of Appeals will affirm the district court’s opinion.”

The Harvard Corporation also said on Tuesday that the university will retain Alan Garber as president for an “indefinite” period. Garber was appointed in Jan. 2024 amid antisemitic, pro-Hamas demonstrations on campus and Harvard’s being pilloried over revelations that Garber’s predecessor, Harvard’s first Black president, Claudine Gay, is a serial plagiarist.

Under Garber’s leadership, Harvard has contested a slew of lawsuits accusing school officials of standing down while anti-Israel activists abused Jewish students. It settled some of the cases and prevailed in others. At the same time, Harvard agreed to incorporate into its policies a definition of antisemitism supported by most of the Jewish community, established new rules governing campus protests, and announced new partnerships with Israeli academic institutions. By all accounts, it is in no rush to settle its dispute with the Trump administration.

“Alan’s humble, resilient, and effective leadership has shown itself to be not just a vital source of calm in turbulent times, but also a generative force for sustaining Harvard’s commitment to academic excellence and to free inquiry and expression,” Harvard Corporation senior fellow Penny Pritzker said in a statement. “Alan has not only stabilized the university but brought us together in support of our shared mission.”

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.

Arizona State University Chabad and Downtown Tempe hold Menorah lighting ceremony on Dec. 7, 2023. Photo: Alexandra Buxbaum vis Reuters Connect

Before Hanukkah (and before the Bondi Beach massacre), my son asked me what the holiday is really about. Not the gifts, not the latkes, not even the oil that famously lasted eight days. “But what actually happened?” he pressed. He has been learning quite a bit in Hebrew school and pushed me: “How did a tiny group win when everyone thought they couldn’t?”

It’s a question that lands differently this year. I told him the truth: Hanukkah is the story of a small, outmatched community refusing to accept that the world’s hatred and power alignments would dictate their future.

The Maccabees were not the strongest or the most numerous. They weren’t protected by empires or alliances. They persevered because they believed their identity mattered, their way of life mattered, and their freedom to live as Jews mattered. And that conviction — rooted in faith, courage, and stubborn hope — carried them through the impossible.

He listened, nodded, and then asked the question so many Jewish parents have heard this year: “Is it like that now?”

I wish the analogy didn’t fit. My son is growing up in a moment when open antisemitism spreads faster than any ancient decree; when mobs surround synagogues, when Jewish students are told they don’t belong, when the Internet can turn ignorance into global hate in seconds. He sees the hate filled graffiti around our neighborhood. He hears others in the city talk about Israel with a hostility that has nothing to do with policy and everything to do with identity. He watches the news and senses the unease in our home when we talk about safety.

And so the Maccabean story is not abstract. It is a mirror.

For years, many of us lived Jewishly in a way that was proud but cautious — visible but not too visible, present but politely understated. 

So many American Jews assumed America would always be different, that the ancient need for Jewish vigilance was something our generation might finally outgrow. But my son’s question made clear that those days are gone. 

The world has changed, and our children deserve a model of Jewish life rooted not in caution, but in confidence.

The miracle of Hanukkah is not just that oil burned longer than nature allowed — it’s that Jews did. That our people insisted on lighting a flame even when the world around them demanded surrender. They restored the Temple not because victory was assured, but because Jewish life itself was worth defending whether or not anyone else agreed.

This year, the miracle feels less like ancient mythology and more like a living assignment. It reminds us that Jewish endurance has never depended on winning the popularity contest of nations. The Jewish people have always survived — and often thrived — by holding firm in who we are even when the world misunderstands, resents, or maligns us.

That lesson came into sharper focus when I showed my son the famous photograph in Kiel, Germany, in 1931 of a menorah in the window facing the Nazi flag across the street — one family defiantly insisting on light when every force around them demanded fear. He stared at it quietly. Then he looked out our own window, the same window where just weeks ago we saw protesters screaming about Jewish power, Zionism, and Israel with a rage meant to intimidate. They called for Israel’s destruction, the death of his family members living in Israel, and the murder of Jews in America for simply existing. It didn’t matter that this was New York, not 1930s Germany; the message was unmistakable.

So this year we have placed our menorah in the window — not tucked away, not dimmed, not hesitating. It is our declaration of resilience, a statement of presence, and a call to the world that Jewish life will not retreat. We will not cower. We will not waver in our right to be here, to belong, to live openly as Jews in the United States or anywhere else. We are resolute. We are defiant. And we are proud.

Some insist that Jews and Jewish institutions must bend — moderate our commitments, soften our existence, or “balance” our right to safety with demands that erase the legitimacy of Jewish peoplehood itself.

Hanukkah teaches the opposite: Jews do not need to contort ourselves to appease ideologies that deny our very right to endure. We are allowed to exist openly. We are allowed to be strong. We are allowed to defend ourselves and our communities. We are allowed to assert that our story, our dignity, and our continuity matter. We are allowed to be proud of our faith, our history, and our place in the world.

And America, if it means what it says about pluralism, has obligations too. A free society does not ask minorities to hide the parts of themselves others find inconvenient. A healthy democracy protects its citizens especially when they are under threat — not only when they are easy to celebrate. Jewish belonging is not conditional. It is anchored in centuries of contribution to American civic, cultural, scientific, intellectual, and communal life. Our presence strengthens this nation; our resilience is not a provocation but a fulfillment of America’s promise.

When I look at my son, I see why this clarity matters. He deserves a Jewish life lived without apology or fear. He deserves a community that is strong, grounded, and proud. He deserves to inherit a tradition defined not by defensiveness, but by purpose.

So yes, I told him, the story of a small group doing the impossible resonates now. Not because we are powerless, but because the pressures to retreat, disappear, or doubt ourselves have returned with force. The right response — now as then — is illumination; bringing light into the world  

One candle does not drive away all darkness. It simply refuses to let the darkness win uncontested. That is what we are called to do right now: to insist on our visibility, to teach our children pride rather than dread, to speak plainly even when others prefer we whisper, and to bring light and enlightenment to a world that too often chooses shadows.

This year, as my son places our menorah in the window, he will know that he is part of that unbroken chain; that he, too, inherits the responsibility to kindle light in an age that would rather see it dimmed. And that the enduring miracle of our people is not simply that a flame once lasted eight days, but that we are still here, still proud, and still unafraid to light it again.

May that light shine powerfully, proudly, and without fear.

Samuel J. Abrams is a professor of politics at Sarah Lawrence College and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.