Some of my favourite memories growing up are of watching the menorah glow from the window sills of so many homes in my neighbourhood in the suburbs of New York. I can't tell you why but there was something about the golden glow of those candles being reflected onto the soft snow of the New York winter which still makes my heart skip a beat.
There is something decidedly public about the lighting of the menorah. Whether that means lighting in your window, outside your front door like myself or even dispelling the darkness with a giant steel menorah in the centre of Central London thanks to Chabad. This idea even expresses itself in the halachic requirement that our menorahs should be lit before people stop walking by in the street (Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 21b).
The menorah in the Temple of ancient Jerusalem represented wisdom, and the daily replenishing of the oil attested to the constant application of knowledge being renewed. Yet thinking about the first menorah we notice that there was something private about its lighting. The beautiful golden candelabra of the Temple was lit by a specific Kohen, often the High Priest himself, in an area which was only seen by a select few, the Kohanim. Yet today our light's shine through the public thoroughfares hoping for as many as possible to see it.
What happened? What changed to necessitate something so private becoming so public?
The Jewish people living in Hellenistic Israel at the time of the Chanukah story had become accustomed to the idea that the world was predictable, with a fixed natural order. They had allowed this attitude to seep into their religious and moral behaviour as well becoming creatures of habit. Going through the motions without enthusiasm. Sometimes we feel this way ourselves, just going through the motions.
The Chanukah miracle changed all that. All of a sudden this lethargic community had seen that things weren't as set in stone as they had led themselves to believe. Change was in the air. The nature of something as simple as olive oil and its power of combustion was called into question. Miracles were now a part of life.
Rabbi Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter (1847 – 1905), known simply as the Sefat Emet (after his greatest rabbinical work), made a masterful play on the words of the Talmud we mentioned earlier. The Talmud states that one should light until people stop (tichleh) walking (regel) by in the street, and rereads it to teach us that the menorah is calling on us to eliminate (tichleh) acting out of habit (hergel) from our everyday lives.
But how do we change our habits? It's so difficult to change the way we've been doing things. What are we meant to do?
The Sefat Emet points out that while the Jews in the story of Chanukah had become somewhat less observant than their grandparents, in the aftermath of this incredible miracle and the inspiration it gave the nation, the sages didn't institute that the Jews begin observing all that they had neglected. Instead they instituted a new mitzvah, the Chanukah candles, hoping that something new would promote a more complete observance.
We can see from this that if change is what you want to achieve then don't rely on repairing your old habits, instead try to find a new path.
If our relationship with God has become stale through prayer then perhaps we could spend more time learning (Chanukah also reminds us of the word Chinuch, education) and if we no longer connect intellectually then perhaps it's time to just try and speak to Him.
Try something new. It will bring you back to something old and familiar. As it happened in those times may it happen in ours.
