How a Jewish educator took the Hanukkah llama from TJ Maxx meme to teachable moment
Sara Beth Berman said her novelty book was “taking a piece of the zeitgeist and attaching it to a story that is meaningful”

“The Hanukkah Llama” imbues a kitschy character with a serious Jewish backstory. (Collage by JTA)
(JTA) — For years, the Hanukkah llama has been a corny cliche that skeptics of the big-box Hanukkah industrial complex love to hate.
What does a South American animal have to do with a holiday commemorating a Jewish miracle in the Middle East? Is a not-quite rhyme enough to justify “Happy Llamakah” sweaters and socks? Just why are the aisles of TJ Maxx and other stores hawking holiday merchandise filled with Hanukkah llama items, alongside “Oy to the World” dish towels and gnomes decked out in blue and white?
“Llamas are particularly adorable, and they’re easy to dress up in Hanukkah fashion, whether it’s sweaters or scarves, or kippot,” offered Rabbi Yael Buechler, a designer of Jewish holiday merchandise and a keen observer of the Jewish marketplace, as a reason for the enduring and befuddling mashup. “And they also have wide backs, so that serves as great storage space for dreidels, hanukkiot.”
In 2020, the trend expanded to include a picture book about a family of llamas celebrating Hanukkah written by a Jewish children’s book author. And now, for the first time, a professional Jewish educator has given the Hanukkah llama a deeply Jewish backstory, in an effort to endow a kitschy character with substance.
“I think a lot about what engages learners and how we engage learners,” said Sara Beth Berman, the author of a 32-page miniature book released last month by Hachette Press. “And so taking a piece of the zeitgeist and attaching it to a story that is meaningful, I think is great.”
Berman was recruited to add a story to a toy that lacked one. The team at Running Press Minis, a division of Hachette Book Group, was gearing up to create the company’s first Hanukkah product in more than two decades.
Running Press puts out tiny “kits” — a toy and a companion text — that make for ideal gifts. The company has put out multiple Christmas kits, and even a “holiday armadillo,” a reference to the “Friends” episode where Ross Geller is dismayed not to find Hanukkah costumes to make the holiday more interesting for his son, who is mesmerized by Christmas. But since “The Little Book of Hanukkah” in 2000, which predated the toy pairing, Running Press hadn’t tackled Hanukkah.
The company knew it wanted to produce a tiny llama with an accompanying book, but it didn’t have an author lined up. Jordana Hawkins, Running Press’ licensing manager, was friendly with Berman’s husband, knew her reputation as an educator and reached out.
“I wanted a Jewish writer to write it and she has a really great sense of humor,” Hawkins told JTA. “She has a really great style and she’s a great writer. And I thought she would be a great fit for it.”
The book is a modern retelling of the Hanukkah story, with Lex Lexabee, the “llama constabulary” of Jerusalem who is acquainted with Mattathias and his sons, including Judah Maccabee, the hero of the Hanukkah story. Lex wears sunglasses, a menorah throw blanket, a blue winter hat, and a scarf with yellow pompoms. Judah Maccabee is the leader of the “Holy Llamas of Jerusalem” — a city that, in this version of the story — is surrounded by snow-capped mountaintops. The story begins in 168 B.C.E., when the Syrian Goat Greeks, led by the mountain goat version of King Antiochus, take over the holy llamas’ place of worship, the Holy Temple of Jerusalem.
Berman, the director of youth and family education at New York’s Temple Shaaray Tefila, was determined to pack seriousness into a 32-page, 3-inch book meant as a gag gift. She was particularly determined to show readers how Jews count time, by introducing, from the very beginning of the book, the years in BCE, and not the Christian BC.
“In Jewish academia, calling it ‘Before the Common Era’ and ‘Common Era’ is the way,” Berman explained. “But most of the people who are like, ‘Oh look, a Hanukkah llama’ — the vast majority of the population isn’t familiar with how academics talk about how our calendar works. So I was really nerdily excited to get that in the book.”
Berman also uses the actual story to explain the “shamash,” the word used for the “helper” candle of the menorah, when Lex officially becomes Lex Lexabee as he turns into Judah Maccabee’s “number one support llama” during the fight to take back the Temple.
The book includes Hanukkah songs and activities, but no blessings. And the accompanying figurine plays one of those songs aloud to what the company says is “a toe-tapping beat.”
“I want people to experience Judaism through joy when they can,” Berman said. “The more joy the merrier. I want Jewish people to feel seen and if this is a small way that people manage their feelings around the holiday season, I’m glad to be a positive part of it.”
For Buechler, just knowing that a seasoned Jewish educator had a hand in the kind of product she might otherwise shake her head about is exciting.
“What we’re seeing here is a Jewish educator authoring a book and a mainstream Hanukkah toy. And that’s significant, because it marks a new model for Hanukkah merchandise,” Buechler said. “This is a new path towards bringing modern merchandise that is well-educated into the Hanukkah market.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Most Popular
- 1
Culture Trump wants to honor Hannah Arendt in a ‘Garden of American Heroes.’ Is this a joke?
- 2
Opinion The dangerous Nazi legend behind Trump’s ruthless grab for power
- 3
Opinion A Holocaust perpetrator was just celebrated on US soil. I think I know why no one objected.
- 4
Culture Did this Jewish literary titan have the right idea about Harry Potter and J.K. Rowling after all?
In Case You Missed It
-
Culture In a Haredi Jerusalem neighborhood, doctors’ visits are free, but the wait may cost you
-
Fast Forward Chicago mayor donned keffiyeh for Arab Heritage Month event, sparking outcry from Jewish groups
-
Fast Forward The invitation said, ‘No Jews.’ The response from campus officials, at least, was real.
-
Fast Forward Latvia again closes case against ‘Butcher of Riga,’ tied to mass murder of Jews
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.