[Avodah] Stealing the Afikoman

[Micha Berger via Avodah]

On Sun, Apr 09, 2017 at 02:42:40AM -0400, Cantor Wolberg via Avodah wrote:
: I tend to agree with the negative aspect of stealing the Afikoman.
: Very similarly, I feel the minhag to get so drunk on Purim so that 
: you can’t distinguish between blessed be Mordecai and cursed be Haman
: is a very bad minhag and more offensive than stealing the afikoman.

Yeah, I don't see how teaching kids to steal the afiqoman is going
to weaken their knowledge that it's wrong to steal. Should kids
playing baseball not steal home? Just because the rule of the game
is called "stealing"?

But there is backlash against the drunk-on-Purim minhag too.
The OU and RCA each put out something like
<https://www.ou.org/holidays/purim/purim_-_rabbi_weinreb2>
annually. Hatzola puts out warnings. There are black-n-white wearing
yeshivos that clamped down on their kids getting drunk when doing
their Purim fundraising.

And there has been backlash to the backlash, by people who value
minhag.

Really, the treatment of the two has been pretty parallel.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             How wonderful it is that
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