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Published on: 3/15/2009
Last Visited: 3/15/2009
But Hummel was dressed as Batman, while Rabbi Jeff Marx was Superman.
"Our theme this year is 'Superheroes,'" Hummel told the Mirror.
"Actually, it's 'SuPurim.'" He was indulging in his own yearning be Batman.
Most of the kids were dressed as their conception of the characters in the Megillah: Queen Esther, her husband King Ahasuerus, and Esther's cousin and guardian Mordecai, who gives her the information about Haman's evil plan.
Nobody seemed to be impersonating Haman, a supercilious and vain character who brings about his own downfall through his foolish conceit.
Haman is mainly remembered via a triangular pastry known as Hamantashen.
These were on sale along with kosher hot dogs, kosher pizza, snow cones, and donuts at the Carnival outside in the synagogue's parking lot.
As with most carnivals, there were vendors, in this case selling rugs, hand-knitted yarmulkes (skull caps), and used books; game booths with wheels of fortune, mini-basketball, and miniature car races; an arts and crafts area where kids made clay figures and painted paper plates with their own designs; and a DJ playing classic oldies.
To anyone not familiar with the Purim tradition, this might not seem to have anything to do with religion.
But as Rabbi Marx explained, Purim is the Jewish holiday that proves the rule by being the exception.
"Purim for centuries has been a day of deliberate transgression," said Marx.
"But we also know that license is actually a way of affirming boundaries and affirming the rules.
It reminds us that the rest of the year, we don't do these things that we can do at Purim."
Costumes, said Marx, are not a new tradition.