Are you really supposed to get so drunk on Purim so as not to be able to tell the difference between Mordecai and Haman? Perhaps the line between good and evil is not so easy to draw, even when sober. But in an age of sky-high drunkenness among teens, drivers and everyone else, we need to be circumspect. Fortunately, many Jewish authorities were, long before M.A.D.D. was around. See some supplementary material on the subject from Rabbis David Golinkin and Barry Dov Lerner here.
I deal with this question in my "Hammerman on Ethics" column on the Jewish Week site - see my response here: Is Drunkenness on Purim a No-No?
See also this post on the drunkenness issue.
And see this responsum on why we blot out Haman's name
And see some background material on Purim, featuring some neat Purim facts, here. Finally, see the Jewish Week's Purim spoof here.
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