Chapter 22
Seeking Light in Dark Times: Chanukkah
In This Chapter
Exploring the story of the Maccabees
Discovering why Jews eat so much fried food during Chanukkah
Revealing hidden lessons in the Chanukkah story
As the winter solstice approaches, the days get shorter, the nights get longer, and the people begin to wonder if the lost light will ever return. The effect of the winter solstice on people is universal: In every major world tradition festivals of light arise at this darkest time of the year. Ancient pagans celebrated the solstice with wild feasts. The ancient Persians set enormous bonfires on the ground while their rulers released birds into the air, dragging torches of burning grass. Jews have Chanukkah, perhaps the most celebrated of all Jewish holidays (at least in North America).
Shining a Light on the Darkest Night
In the Jewish calendar, Chanukkah’s eight-day celebration begins the evening of the 25th of Kislev (which falls sometime during December). The months of the Jewish calendar are based on the cycles of the moon, so the 25th is always four days before the new moon, the darkest time of the month.
More importantly, because Kislev is always close to the winter solstice, Chanukkah takes you into, through, and out of the darkest night of the year. (The solstice is technically the longest night of the year, but it may fall on the full moon, which would make it far from dark.) On the darkest night of the year, wouldn’t you want to light a few candles?
Please don’t call Chanukkah “the Jewish Christmas.” Jews have nothing against Christmas, but Chanukkah is completely different. Making the comparison is like saying that Cinco de Mayo is “the Mexican Mother’s Day,” just because these two holidays appear during the same month.
The Good Fight: What Chanukkah Celebrates
Chanukkah celebrates two things: a miracle in which one day’s worth of oil burned for eight days, and the victory of the Jewish freedom fighters over the Syrian-Greek forces that tried to wipe out Judaism in the second century BCE. In this way, Chanukkah marks the very first battle fought not for territory, nor for conquest of another people, but in order to achieve religious freedom.
The consequence of that ancient military victory was the right of the Jews to worship as a community. Because of the many times that this right has been threatened over the centuries, the Jewish victory and the rededication to Jewish worship that followed have become paradigms for Jewish renewal across time. In fact, the word Chanukkah means “dedication.”
In a larger sense, then, Chanukkah celebrates a reaffirmation of freedom and a recommitment to the spiritual quest.
The two books of the Maccabees
The story of Chanukkah is told in the two books of the Maccabees, written sometime in the first century BCE, about a hundred years after the whole drama happened. Basically, by 325 BCE, Alexander the Great’s Greek empire extended all the way to the current-day Middle East, and it was Alexander’s policy to allow people to celebrate according to their own religious beliefs. However, after he died, the empire split into smaller pieces ruled by a succession of men who didn’t share Alexander’s generosity.
Antiochus was such a ruler. After giving himself the surname Epiphanes (“god manifest”), he decided to forcibly rid his empire of local religions, including Judaism. He outlawed — upon penalty of death — kosher food, circumcision, and Shabbat services (see Chapter 18). You have to understand that many Jews at the time were attracted to the great art, philosophies, and culture of the Greeks. So much so that they went along with Antiochus’s rule (they were typically called “Hellenists”).
On the other hand, some Jews were, well, less happy with the arrangement. One objector, Mattathias (a priestly descendant of Moses’ brother, Aaron), was so “less happy” that when one local assimilated Jew tried to follow the king’s commandment by making a sacrifice to the Greek gods, Mattathias killed him.
Judah puts the hammer down
Fleeing to the mountains with his five sons, Mattathias gathered an army of other pious believers and began a bloody revolution that lasted three years (from 169 to 166 BCE). After Mattathias’s death, his son Judah led the guerrilla warfare against Antiochus’s forces and the assimilated Jews. In fact, Judah was so fierce that his family was given the name Maccabee (which means “hammer” in Hebrew).
Finally, after a series of terrible clashes, the Maccabees retook Jerusalem, drove out the Syrian-Greek army, and began repairing the desecrated grounds of the Second Temple (see Chapter 13). As it turns out, Antiochus had picked a propitious time to seize the Temple: the 25th of Kislev, which falls near the darkest day of the year. Perhaps in a symbolic gesture of renewal, Judah decided to rededicate the Temple on exactly the same day, in 164 BCE, and pronounced that the nation should henceforth memorialize this rededication with an eight-day celebration.
The story of the oil miracle
History is a funny thing. By the time the later sections of the Talmud were being written (around 500 CE; see Chapter 3), the political situation had changed radically, and the rabbis were less enamored of the Maccabees. First of all, as is so often the case with armed revolutionaries, the victorious Maccabean families later set themselves up as kings over the land and became as oppressive as the previous regime (see Chapter 13). Worse, as time went on, their descendants allied themselves with the Roman Empire, leading to the eventual Roman conquest.
Although the rabbis didn’t want to reject the Chanukkah celebration, they decided instead to emphasize a different aspect of the holiday in their commentary. Legend had it that when the Temple was rededicated (see Chapter 13), the Maccabees could only find a single cruse (a small vessel) of pure oil, enough to burn the Eternal Flame for one night. Unfortunately, it would take eight days to get more oil. God, the Talmud says, performed a miracle and made the oil last for eight nights.
The Talmud’s subtle message: People should celebrate the miracle of the oil more than the military victory. Tradition therefore includes these words from the Prophet Zachariah as part of the synagogue readings on Chanukkah: “Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, says the Eternal One . . .”
The Maccabees get their due
For almost 2,000 years, Chanukkah was known as one of the minor holidays of the Jewish calendar. Then, gradually, beginning in the late nineteenth century, Jews began to pay more attention to the story of the Maccabees. And, today, Chanukkah is arguably the most celebrated of the Jewish holidays (or at least it’s in a head-to-head tie with Passover). What happened?
Several things changed in the late nineteenth century. First, Christmas gift giving became more popular, particularly in North America. Many Jews, seeing how attractive Christmas was to children, found new meaning and usefulness in celebrating Chanukkah. Plus, the miracle of the burning oil and the victorious story of the Maccabees could easily be interpreted as anti-assimilationist, and so Jews adopted it as a tool for strengthening Jewish identity at a time when that felt increasingly important.
Finally, the Zionist movement (see Chapter 15) began to look more favorably on the military tactics of the Maccabees. Once again, the debate was renewed between those Jews who believed in armed struggle and those who supported peaceful action.
Embracing Chanukkah Customs
When David was a child, his family lived in an area of England far removed from other Jewish kids, and his parents felt bad about celebrating Chanukkah when all their neighbors celebrated Christmas. Their compromise: Celebrate both. But Christmas was clearly just a gift giving time to David’s family, so it was Chanukkah that he still remembers as a time for stories, singing, candle lighting, and quality family time.
Will the real menorah please stand up?
When most people talk about a menorah, they really mean a chanukkiah (pronounced “khan-oo-kee-ah,” with the guttural “kh” sound; the plural is channukkiot). The menorah is simply a candelabra, and it traditionally holds seven candles (or has seven oil wicks). The seven-candle version is on the official emblem of the State of Israel. The chanukkiah is a candelabra with nine candles or wicks: one for each night of Chanukkah plus the shammash, which is the candle that you use to light the other candles. The difference is subtle, but next time you’re ordering a “menorah” at some Internet e-commerce site, you’ll know enough to look closely.
The only essential ritual to perform at Chanukkah is the lighting of the candles, which are held in a chanukkiah, which is a candelabra with nine candles or wicks (see Figure 22-1). But families have developed many other traditions that are also meaningful. In this section, we take a look at some of these traditions; who knows, you might just find a few that your kids will someday remember.
Figure 22-1: The traditional chanukkiah on the second night of Chanukkah.
Lighting the candles
The Talmud (see Chapter 3) says that two great first-century rabbis each teach a different method of lighting the candles. According to Hillel, you should light one candle the first night, two on the second night, and so on until all eight candles are burning on the eighth night. This is the current practice, even though another sage named Shammai encouraged people to light all eight candles the first night and remove one candle each night to reflect the diminishing of the original oil.
The lighting of the candles is traditionally accompanied or followed by a series of prayers (see the following section for more information). After the candles have been lit and blessed, many families open presents, eat special holiday foods, and play Chanukkah games (keep reading for more information on these traditions).
Several rules govern the lighting of the candles:
Direction: Insert the first candle farthest to the right, adding candles to the left of the first one each night. However, when lighting the candles, start with the left-most candle (the one that represents the current night), and keep going to the right until all the candles are lit (eight candles plus the shammash will be burning on the last day). If you have an oil lamp, then also fill and light the oil cups in this order.
Use: Don’t use the light from these candles to read by. You shouldn’t even use the Chanukkah candles to light other candles; so in order to light them in the first place, you use an extra candle, called the shammash.
Position: Place the chanukkiah in a window to publicly proclaim the miracle of the burning oil. Of course, during times when a public announcement of one’s Judaism would be dangerous, this rule is relaxed.
Duration: Allow the candles to burn for at least a half hour — so don’t blow them out as soon as you’ve finished opening presents!
Timing: When Chanukkah takes place on Shabbat, light the Chanukkah candles before you light the Shabbat candles. Traditionally, you don’t light any more candles after lighting the Shabbat candles.
Some families have a chanukkiah for each family member, others take turns lighting the candles, and in some households, everyone holds the shammash together and lights each candle together. Whatever you do, try to get everyone involved.
Blessings for the moment
Here are the three blessings recited over the lighting of the chanukkiah:
Barukh Atah Adonai Eloheynu Melekh Ha-Olam, asher kid’shanu b’mitzvotav vitzivanu l’hadlik ner shel Chanukkah.
Blessed are You, Eternal One Our God, Universal Ruling Presence, Who sanctifies us with mitzvot [paths of holiness] and gives us this path of kindling the light of Chanukkah.
Miracles yesterday and today
Traditionally, the second Chanukkah prayer ends with bazman hazeh (“in that time”). However, a prayerbook of Conservative Judaism changes one word: Their blessing says that we bless the Eternal One who worked miracles for our ancestors in those days u’vaz’man hazeh (“and at this time”) — signifying the continuation of the miracle of light over the ages. For those who tend to see God working in the present tense, this version can be more fitting.
Blessed are You, Eternal One Our God, Barukh Atah Adonai Eloheynu Melekh Ha-Olam, sheh-asah nissim l’avoteynu ba-yamim ha-haym baz’man hazeh.
Universal Ruling Presence, Who worked miracles for our ancestors in ancient days at this time.
On the first night of Chanukkah, Jews add the following blessing:
Barukh Atah Adonai, Eloheynu Melekh ha-olam, sheh-heh-khi-yanu v’key’manu v’hee-gee-anu laz’man ha-zeh.
Blessed are You, Eternal One our God, Universal Ruling Presence, Who keeps us in Life always, Who supports the unfolding of our uniqueness, and Who brings us to this very moment for blessing.
Remembering the oil: Yummy fried foods
For most Jews, latkes conjure up images of an Eastern European Jewish delicacy: potato pancakes hot off the griddle, moist with oil, and ready to be eaten with applesauce or sour cream (see the recipe for latkes in this chapter).
In fact, Chanukkah is a favorite holiday for some Jews because of the fried food associated with it. Jews are supposed to eat food fried in oil as a reminder of the miracle of the oil burning for eight days! In Israel, the customary special fried delicacies for Chanukkah are jelly donuts called sufganiot.
Latkes
Prep time: 10 minutes • Cook time: 40 minutes • Yield: 18 patties
Ingredients
6 to 8 russet (baking) or Yukon
Gold potatoes, grated
1 medium onion, grated
1 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs, beaten
1⁄3 cup of matzah meal or flour
1⁄8 teaspoon pepper (white pepper is best)
Vegetable oil for frying
Directions
1. In a large bowl combine grated potatoes, onions, and salt. Let the mixture stand in a fine-sieve colander for five or ten minutes before squeezing out as much of the moisture as you can. (You can also squeeze the mixture in a clean dish towel.)
2. In a large bowl combine the eggs, matzah meal or flour, and pepper.
3. Add potato mixture to the matzah mixture and stir together.
4. In a frying pan or griddle, add oil and heat the oil over medium-high heat until it’s hot but not smoking; this isn’t the time to fret about using too much oil (remember that it’s almost a commandment to cook with oil during Chanukkah).
5. Put a heaping teaspoon of batter on the hot pan and spread out the batter so that it’s about 1⁄4 in thick and about 2 to 3 inches in diameter. Cook the latkes until they’re golden brown underneath, about 4 to 5 minutes, then flip them over and cook the other side to golden brown.
6. When each latke is done, place it on one or two paper towels and blot off any excess oil. Keep the latkes heated in the oven until ready to serve.
Per serving: Calories 278 (From Fat 143); Fat 16g (Saturated 2g); Cholesterol 62mg; Sodium 415mg; Carbohydrate X30g (Dietary Fiber 3g); Protein 5g.
Tip: Alternate grating the potato and the onion, mixing the result together as you go (this helps stop the starch from turning that icky brown color).
Variation: Some people add scallions, parsley, or other herbs to their latkes before cooking them
Serving suggestion: Serve the latkes with sour cream, applesauce, jam, powdered sugar, regular sugar, cinnamon sugar, yogurt, or whatever strikes your fancy.
Spinning the dreidel
The official Chanukkah game is called spin the dreidel. A dreidel (pronounced dray-del) is a four-sided spinning top with the Hebrew letters nun, gimel, hay, and shin printed on each side (see Figure 22-2). The letters are the initials for the phrase Nes Gadol Hayah Sham, which means “A great miracle happened there.”
Dreidels in Israel are slightly different. The shin is replaced with a pay, the first letter in the word poh. This changes the phrase to “A great miracle happened here.”
Figure 22-2: Spinning dreidels is the official game of Chanukkah.
Each person starts with a pile of nuts, pennies, candies, or other small treasures. Before each spin of the dreidel, everyone puts one nut, penny, or whatever into the pot (the center of the table). Next, take turns spinning the dreidel:
If your dreidel lands with nun side up, nothing happens and the next player (to the left) spins.
If your dreidel lands with gimel side up, you win all the pieces in the pot, and all the players ante-up (put a nut, penny, or candy in the pot) again before the next spin.
If your dreidel lands with hay side up, you take half the pieces in the pot. (Or half the pieces minus one, if there’s an odd number of pieces.)
If your dreidel lands with shin side up, you put one more piece into the pot.
Play until the next round of latkes is ready!
The origin of the dreidel is a mystery. Some people believe that the dreidel was a subterfuge adopted by Jews when the authorities forbade studying Torah. To avoid being caught studying, the Jews would pull out their dreidels and pretend that they were gambling.
A first-timers’ guide to Chanukkah
Chanukkah parties are becoming increasingly popular, and they include singing and lots of food. But don’t look for a Christmas tree! (Some friends of ours decorate what they call a “Channukah bush,” but it’s not the same thing, and most Jews find it unfitting.) If you’re invited to this kind of party, check to see if people are bringing gifts. If gifts are being exchanged, remember that the typical Chanukkah giftwrap is blue and white, not red and green. If, on the other hand, the Chanukkah celebration is more like a quiet family affair, consider bringing small, inexpensive gifts just for the children. Many stores sell chocolate in the shapes of coins (“Chanukkah gelt”), which can be a fun and simple gift.
To gift, or not to gift
Chanukkah, as a festival of light, falls close to Christmas, another festival of light, and — in case you weren’t paying attention — it’s nearly impossible to avoid the inexorable tug at your pocketbook during this time of year. Jews don’t see anything wrong with giving presents to kids on Chanukkah. In fact, unless you’re prepared to deal with years of psychotherapy bills for your children, it’s probably best to offer them some sort of gift.
For many Jewish children, the question is not, “Do I get a gift?” but “Do I get a gift every night?” Sometimes families give smaller gifts on each night, and sometimes they exchange fewer but larger gifts. However, Chanukkah is much more than simply a time for gifts.
You don’t have to give gifts that cost money. Gifts of service — like helping with chores, serving breakfast in bed, and so on — sound trite, but they can be deeply satisfying for everyone involved. And some families encourage gifts that they make themselves.
Receiving the Real Gift of Chanukkah: Personal Renewal
The Chanukkah lights are to be enjoyed along with the foods and the gifts and the warmth of family and friendship. Yet, you can find deeper meaning in the candles that you light.
Before lighting each candle, you might ask yourself, “What do I wish to illuminate in my world with this light?” Your answer may reflect some personal need or something you know another person needs. You might dedicate a candle to bring greater light into the whole world, to ease the suffering, and to increase the joy.
Try taking some time to simply be with your candles after they are lit. Sit quietly and follow the instructions from the mystical teachers of Jewish tradition: Gaze gently at the flames before you. Let your body and your mind relax, and allow yourself to move into a deeper and more holy space of awareness.