[Avodah] Are Upsherin and Bonfires Taken from the Gentiles?

[Yitzchok Levine]

Rabbi Seth Mandel has sent me an email regarding these topics and 
given me permission to disseminate what he wrote.

He began by referring me to a post of his dated 5/21/2003 on Avodah. 
It is available at

http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/vol11/v11n014.shtml#17b>http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/vol11/v11n014.shtml#17b 


In this post Rabbi Mandel begins by discussing the origin of the term 
bonfire. It comes from the terminology bone fire. Such fires using 
bones were made by Christians and this is where the term bonfire comes from.

He then goes on to discuss the origin of cutting a child's hair, and 
its relationship to bonfires. He writes in part:

Can the custom of bonfires on Lag Ba'omer have arisen among the Jews
separately and independently from the non-Jewish sources? Theoretically
it's possible. Books like Minhag Yisroel Toyre he brings all sorts
of reasons from various chasidic rebbes and from the book Ta'amei
haMinhogim for the origin of the bonfires on Lag Ba'omer. The problem
with all the explanations is that a) they are all of recent origin, and
b) they somehow ignore the fact that the custom was completely unknown
to any Jews up until the time when it is recorded in EY in the 16th
century. Furthermore, it was the custom there of only one group of Jews,
the Musta'ribim, about whom other Jews complained that they had adopted
a lot of Arab customs (the very name mean "Arabicized).

  From contemporary documents we learn the Muslims (and a few Jews) cut the
hair of children as well as lit a bonfires on the yohrtzeit (28 of Iyyar)
of non other than the aforementioned Shmu'el haNavi. However, in the
1560s the Arab authorities forbade Jews to go there. Shortly afterwards,
we have the testimony of R. Chaim Vital that he was told by R. Yonatan
Sagiz that a year before he started learning by the Ari, in the Ari's
first year after he immigrated from his homeland of Egypt (also 1570),
that "Mori v'Rabbi Z'L took his small son and all of his family there
[to the celebration on RaShBY 's yohrtzeit in Meron] and there he cut
his hair in accordance with the custom." R. Chaim Vital is careful to
note, however, that "I do not know whether at that time he was expert
and knowledgeable in this wondrous wisdom [Qabbolo] as he became after
that." IOW, R. Chaim Vital himself is cautioning the reader that he has
doubts about whether the Ari did this in accordance with his views in
Qabbolo, or just because it was a popular celebration, and he might not
have participated had he already been an expert in Qabbolo.

Some historians believe that once the Musta'ribim were forbidden to go
to the qever of Sh'muel haNavi, they transferred their celebration to
Meron and the date to Lag Ba'Omer. Others claim that the custom at Meron
predated 1570. But both groups agree that both of these customs, cutting
the hair of the children and making bonfires, were practiced by the Arabs
and the Musta 'ribim, but not by any of the Ashk'nazi and S'faradi Jews
in Israel. Of great interest is that the local rabbis in Tz'fat, who had
the practice of going to the all the known q'vorim of the Tano'im from
the middle of Iyyar until Shavu'os and having a seder in learning there,
opposed the celebrations of the Musta'ribim on Lag ba'Omer and tried
to forbid it. They made little headway, and once it became known that
the Ari participated one year, any opposition was swept away. We know
from travelers to EY in the 18th and 19th centuries that the "hilula"
at Meron on Lag Ba'Omer with bonfires and the cutting of children's
hair had become an affair of the masses. A well known talmid chochom
from Europe, R. Avrohom Rozanes, writes that in his visit to EY in 1867
he saw an Ashk'nazi Jew who had taken his son to the "hilula" and was
giving him a haircut. R. Rozanes says that he could not restrain himself,
and went to that Jew and tried to dissuade him but was unsuccessful, and
that most of the Ashk'nazi and S'faradi Jews of EY participate in this
"craziness," with "drinking and dancing and fires."

Please see all that Rabbi Mandel wrote at 
http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/vol11/v11n014.shtml#17

In a message to me today, Rabbi Mandel added:

As you can see, both the bonfire and "opsheren" are probably 
borrowings from other religions, which should be problematic due to 
"uvhukkotehem al telekhu."  The fact that these customs were not 
known to the BeShT or R. Berel Mezricher or to anyone in Europe has 
not stopped the chasidim from making a bid deal out of it. The source 
for the date of LaG Ba'Omer as the yohrtzeit of RaShBY is the 
Zohar.  The identification of his grave in Meron is attributed to the 
Ari.  However, there are other holy graves in Meron that predate the 
Ari and, as I state in the article, the celebration was moved to 
Meron only after Jews were prohibited from going to anNabi 
Samwil.  And the importance of these customs being known only among 
the Musta'rabim (Jews who adopted Arab customs) cannot be 
overemphasized; the S'faradim themselves did not know them, let alone 
the m'qubbalim, who would have been expected to be most scrupulous 
about customs relating to the Ari.  For a linguist, the importance of 
the ceremony being called "halaqe" (Arabic for "shaving, haircut") 
also cannot be overemphasized.  As most people are aware, Jews have 
always used Hebrew words for old Jewish minhogim, even if there was a 
suitable term in the spoken language (e.g. Shabbos rather than 
Sabbath, or bris rather than circumcision), because the Hebrew term 
carried with it the connotations of the Jewish dinim and minhogim 
associated with it.  Arabic (and Germanic/Yiddish) were only used for 
customs that did not have a Jewish background (e.g. shtreimel or 
yarmulke or farbrengen). What I did not put in the article, because 
it was too long already, is that there is historical evidence that in 
the years after the Ari, this celebration became a bone of 
contention.  The m'qubbalim used to gather at the grave of RaShBY (as 
identified by the Ari) on his yohrtzeit, fasting and saying over 
things from the Zohar (in accordance with the authentic Jewish 
custom, mentioned in the G'moro, of giving honor to someone niftar by 
saying things in his name).  They used to quarrel with the Jews 
coming to do the Arab celebration, trying to stop it. But, as I have 
said many times: Jews (or Gentiles), given the choice between two 
practices, one involving fasting and studying, and the other 
involving music, singing, dancing, and other frivolities, will 
inevitably chose one.  And I scarcely need to tell you which one.





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