The holiday of Hanukkah begins tonight at sundown, and it will last for eight days until Monday, December 26th. While the winter holidays share things in common there are also rich nuances that emerge as we learn about the multiple meanings of the holidays that mingle this week – Hanukkah, Winter Solstice, and Christmas.
One that comes to mind is that they don’t always fall so close together as this year, and this can make all the difference. The Winter Solstice, an earth-based holiday, falls on December 21st and Christmas, a Christian and traditional Unitarian Universalist holiday falls on December 25th. This means that the length of the light is longer the day after the solstice and the day after Christmas.
Hanukkah, however, can begin as early as November 28th and as late as December 27th. Some years, Hanukkah, or the festival of lights, ends at a time when the nights grow lengthier and the world around us continues to grow colder and darker.
To me, this nuance has everything to do with the story of The Christmas Menorahs about how a town fought hate in Billings, Montana.[1] And, it has everything to do with where we find ourselves now in a time of increasing climate injustice, and with the recent resurgence of white nationalism, and the persistence of white supremacy.
There are times in history when we are called to believe in the miracles that the light of love can make possible when we kindle it in our hearts. Peace is born out of a time of war. Liberation is the work of a time of oppression. Love is the move in a time of fear, isolation, and othering.
Sometimes we need to possess the courage to be a spark of change even when we don’t witness immediate results. Sometimes we need to keep lighting candles for eight nights because each night of practice increases our ability to bring a quality of love that shines amidst a backdrop of fear.
When I met Isaac Schnitzer and Teresa Hanley when I was younger, and they were younger, it struck me how their story replicated this lesson of Hanukkah. At first, Isaac felt frightened and alone in a cold and the dark winter.
Then, he learned how others in his town were also experiencing acts of violence and hate and bullying. Antisemitism, Islamophobia, racism, xenophobia, and all the other isms and phobias are linked. They exist when power is hoarded by a few, and when that power is used to dehumanize and oppress others.
We must name that the origins of the United States are linked to a terrible history of genocide of Native Peoples. This is linked to antisemitism and Islamophobia – the very same year that the Spanish Inquisition was going on in Europe – and Jews and Muslims were being forced to convert to Christianity or be killed – is the year that Columbus set sail towards what he thought was “India.” In fact, the European settlers when they came upon Native American’s sacred sites called them mosques and synagogues at first. The same tactics that happened in the inquisition were repeated here.[2]
We must also name that our history, including the history of unchecked capitalism, is linked to slavery and anti-black racism. Again, a select few have access to power and others in the system are exploited, viewed as less than, and oppressed.
One way that this can be disrupted is when everyone who is impacted by bullies and oppressors rises together to resist and say no more!
We are all impacted by a system where we are cast as characters who either have power and misuse it or hoard it, or cast as characters who are powerless. There is another way.
The story of a town of people who are part of the “in-group” – white Christians – and groups who are “othered” – in this story we heard Native American, Jewish, and Black families, and a child in a wheelchair – when they all come together to grow the sparks of courage to resist hatred and othering – they begin to move down a new path of bridge building, peace building, and glimpse the collective liberation that is possible. Isaac and Teresa testified to how the actions of the white supremacists in their town stopped.
But, remember the holiday of Hanukkah reminds us this requires continuous practice. White supremacy isn’t finished in our country and sadly acts of vandalism and violence are not over.
The word Hanukkah means re-dedication. We need to re-dedicate ourselves continuously to shine the warmth of love to counter the chilling events rooted in fear.
Hanukkah centers around a question of miracles. My fellow Unitarian Universalists, do we believe they happen? And, how?
I appreciate Abraham Joshua Heschel’s quote on this topic, “Pray as if everything depends on God, but act as if everything depends on you.”
While we as Unitarian Universalists don’t necessarily think of prayer as moving God; rather we tend to use this practice to move ourselves. The point is well taken.
Are we looking for someone else or for God to be the spark of change? Do we need to see evidence of change before we are willing to make the first move?
Or, do we believe that within us lies a spirit of love, a spark of the divine, or the force of moral conscience that could make a difference, especially when we join our spark in a communion of struggle.
There are at two miracles that form the core of Hanukkah stories. One is about the miracle of oil, and one is about a military victory. The latter is problematic. I’ll start there.
Much like during the Spanish inquisition, when King Antiochus rose to power in 175 BC, he wanted to unite his people under one religion. He forced Jewish people to choose between practicing the Greek religion or death. Now, some Jews acquiesced; they converted to the King’s Hellenistic religion. But, a small group of rebels, the Maccabees decided to fight against the empire and won their freedom.
However, militarism is dangerous, and we live with the danger today. It is one thing to fight against oppression; it is another when victory leads a group to become like their oppressors. One example, the Maccabees following victory, attacked Jews who practiced differently than them.
While it is a holiday connected to religious freedom, much like the story of our forebears, the Puritans, who came to this country claiming freedom, they didn’t extend to others. Hanukkah reminds me to wrestle with complicated stories of today and yesterday and to ask how did we rise in that episode of history? How did we fall short of the light of love?
The second story centers around a miracle of oil. When the Jews returned to the ransacked temple, they found only one jar of oil, that would only last one night. The miracle we celebrate by lighting one more candle each night of Hanukkah is that one jar lasted 8 nights! In this story God and the great mystery are centered. But, I also see human activity at work. It wasn’t God who lit that jar. To fulfill the commandment, one day of oil wasn’t enough. The regular menorah has seven branches. He could have said, it isn’t worth it… there isn’t enough here to give the light required. But, no, he lit it anyway. His action sparked a light that joined with the divine light and it lasted eight days and nights.
That’s what was required of Isaac – to have the courage to put his menorah up for one more night. That’s what’s required of Teresa’s family and all of the families in Billings – to have the courage to join their family’s light with Isaac’s family’s light.
That’s what’s required of all of us here and now, today – to have the courage to resist the bully one more day and to have the courage and creativity to practice love as a daily act of resistance and hope for the light of a world yet to be.
So, Happy Hanukkah! May the lights twinkle brightly in the night tonight.
[1] The Christmas Menorahs: How a Town Fought Hate, by Janice Cohn
[2] https://www.jfrej.org/assets/uploads/JFREJ-Understanding-Antisemitism-November-2017-v1-3-2.pdf
Topics: The Holy