“Eight are the days, and eight are the nights: Happy Joyous Hannukah!”  So wrote Woody Guthrie, in a recently-revived holiday classic.  And seven are the days of nights of Kwanzaa; and for many, there are twelve days of Christmas.  This year, they all overlap.

               Guthrie, author of so much of the pluralistic progressive American songbook from the New Deal to the Great Society, lived until 1967 – the second year in which Kwanzaa, now a central holiday across much of Black America drawing on African roots, was celebrated.  The values it elevates – see below – are true middot (attribute-values we should each work on in ourselves) for our times.

               And where for much of two millennia, Christmas was saw little merriment or light or joy (often quite the opposite) for Jews living under the Cross – today we are privileged to learn with and from one another, and to celebrate each other’s holidays.  For everyone in homes of friends or family honoring traditions other than our own:  an extra “Happy Holidays, to you!”

              COEJL is the small Jewish pillar of the National Religious Partnership for the Environment – alongside Protestant (Creation Justice Ministries), Catholic (Catholic Climate Covenant), Evangelical (Evangelical Environmental Network) and other efforts at caring for Creation.  What a force we are, when united!  See also the magic of the Interfaith Power and Light network, with which we work so closely.  The more multi-faith our coalitions and our relationships, the more power we have, and the more light we bring.

               Our work is cut out for us, perhaps now more than ever – but the way we’ll get there is TOGETHER.  Relationship is key to all that we can and will do.  Collective work on behalf of our common home is one of the best ways to develop those connections, and join shoulder-to-shoulder.  It behooves us all to reach out across lines of difference – faith, race, nationality, ideology, and more – and to work (and sing!) in concert with one another. 

               Let that be our New Year’s resolution!  Please support groups like COEJL.org (and Adamah and Dayenu and Jewish Earth Alliance) doing the work within our respective faith communities – and also groups like NRPE and IPL, uniting all of us in common cause, amplifying our power and magnifying our light.

               Bonus resource #1, for those somewhat Hebrew-conversant:  a powerful set of intentions and songs for each night of Hannukah, from  the freeing of hostages to justice and peace and coexistence – including, on the fifth night, for the svivah, our sacred environment, of which each of us is a holy part.   With thanks to Itamar Ben David, see https://acrobat.adobe.com/id/urn:aaid:sc:AP:9d57d3b3-25a5-4d1a-bc38-09161fee5e5c.

              And a final bonus resource #2, for all of us early on our journey into learning with and from one another:  Kwanzaa’s Seven Days fall neatly this year within Hannukah’s eight, which commence on Christmas – all solstice adjacent (after all, “the reason for the season is: axial tilt!) to Solstice.  Here are those values, worth each of us focusing on and developing, in ourselves and our communities.  Happy Holidays, all!                 

 
Umoja (Unity): To strive for and to maintain unity in the family, community, nation, and race.

Kujichagulia (Self-determination): To define and name ourselves, as well as to create and speak for ourselves.

Ujima (Collective work and responsibility): To build and maintain our community together and make our brothers' and sisters' problems our problems and to solve them together. 

Ujamaa (Cooperative economics): To build and maintain our own stores, shops, and other businesses and to profit from them together.

Nia (Purpose): To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.

Kuumba (Creativity): To do always as much as we can, in the way we can, in order to leave our community more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it.

Imani (Faith): To believe with all our hearts in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders, and the righteousness and victory of our struggle.