Driving down the streets of Manhattan
after Shabbat, I was struck by the sight of hundreds of Protestants walking
towards the Cathedral for Midnight Mass. I returned home to discover Catholics had
lined the sidewalks outside my house waiting to enter a local church. There’s
something very moving about seeing people go to shul.
With Chanukah candles in some
windows, and Christmas trees in others, December in America lends itself to
mushy ecumenical statements of “hey, we’re not so different after all”. I
believe the differences between religions and identities are critical, but pointing
out the shared moments is just as important.
This week, as the pope bemoaned the fact that “the superficial glitter”
hides the real meaning of the religion and its values, I too
was nodding: "Today Christmas has become a commercial celebration, whose
bright lights hide the mystery of God's humility, which in turn calls us to
humility and simplicity." The Pope was calling it the way it is: out
of the legitimate desire to turn Christmas into a less religious day and more
of a “one size fits all” December holiday, the deeper meanings of the day are often
lost. It’s good to have a day to celebrate family, and exchanging gifts is a
great way to strengthen relationships. I also find value in families of diverse
religious backgrounds finding creative ways to showcase their complex identities
in their homes. But rituals and holidays have deeper meanings and statements
that can easily be lost if there is nothing but glitter and gift wrapping, and
it is up to us to infuse our rituals with the deeper meaning, values and
narratives we wish to give as a gift to ourselves this year.
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Agreeing
with the pope and being inspired by people of other religions as they pray, reminded
me that while as a Jew I have a strong coalition with Jews of all practices
and beliefs, Jews are not my only coalition. As a religious person in
the modern world, I have a coalition with religious people of other faiths,
as we claim together that living a spiritual life of humility and observance is
a value in this secular age we live in. Watching the news from Beit Shemesh this week, where
extremist Ultra-Orthodox men have pushed all boundaries in their misogynistic
ways, I was reminded that religious extremists have their own coalition, with
communities of various religions reacting to modernity in similar fundamentalist
ways. In response to them I belong to a third coalition, of people
who promote liberal and humanistic values, beyond and within categories of
religiosity or faith. But that deserves its own post…
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So how do I
hold a complex identity that shares values across political and religious
boundaries, and yet retains its unique authenticity? Hanukkah offers us the
ability to celebrate both within our Jewish identity, alongside celebrating a
deeper human phenomenon that is shared across cultures. People love to point
out the “ancient pagan” origins of certain holidays, but for the
non-historicists among us this is just another word for “ancient human”
origins. Hannukah, like many other winter holidays, is a festival of lights
which arrives around the darkest night of the year. The Talmud itself retells
the Hanukkah story as a humanistic holiday. In this version, from Tractate
Avodah Zara (as part of a discussion of what distinguishes Jewish from
pagan!) Hanukkah is described as having been enstated by Adam, the first
human being. The language of the Adam Hanukkah myth mimics, almost parodies, the
story of the Maccabees’ Hannukah:
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Our Rabbis taught:
When Adam [the first human] noticed
that the days were getting shorter, he
said:
"Shame on me,
the world is perhaps becoming darker
because of my sins,
and will soon return to chaos! Is this what
the heavens meant when they punished me with mortality?"
For eight days he prayed and fasted.
When the period of Tevet [the month after
Kislev] arrived
and he saw that the days were now growing longer,
he realized: "This is the way of the world."
Adam then made eight days of celebration.
The following year he instated these and
those as holidays.
Talmud Bavli Avodah Zara 8b
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תנו רבנן [שנו רבותינו]:
לפי שראה אדם הראשון יום שמתמעט והולך,
אמר: "אוי לי, שמא בשביל שסרחתי עולם חשוך בעדי וחוזר לתוהו
ובוהו,
וזו היא מיתה שנקנסה עלי מן השמים",
עמד וישב ח' ימים בתענית [ובתפלה],
כיון שראה תקופת טבת
וראה יום שמאריך והולך,
אמר: "מנהגו של עולם הוא",
הלך ועשה שמונה ימים טובים,
לשנה האחרת עשאן לאלו ולאלו ימים טובים
(תלמוד בבלי מסכת עבודה זרה דף ח עמוד ב)
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The admittance of the Talmud that Hanukkah did
not start with the Maccabees holds a critical lesson for living in a world of
multiple narratives. It allows me to celebrate my story, the Maccabean
Hanukkah, alongside recognizing the universal elements of the holiday, and rejoicing
in those as well. We could rewind all the holidays into a humanitrian unitarian
mush, or fast forward them into a bland commercial festivus, but I personally
am invested in each group celebrating their own narrative, while recognizing
and rejoicing those other narratives as well. It bears the danger of becoming
hyper-particularistic, but it also retains the rich authenticity of unique
traditions, that each hold their own recipe for a better world.
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Before leaving Hanukkah and this Talmudic
passage, on this night of 8 candles it is worth pointing out that this story
also makes a very moving statement about the human reaction to darkness. When
Adam first realizes that sunlight is diminishing and the nights are getting
longer, he immediately turns to blame himself for this suffering. But once he
realizes that this darkness is not about him, his guilt or even his repentance,
but rather that this is “the way of the world”, he then CELEBRATES it.
In this story, Hanukkah is a celebration of the fact
that there are times in which darkness happens, and yet it is followed by times
of increased light. Human beings lighting candles during the darkest nights
is perhaps part of a divine-human covenant: when God’s world (tragically?) provides
more darkness, we human beings promise to step up and provide more light. Mortality
is not a “fall of man”, it is “the way of the world”, and it requires a
certain response from us – lighting candles. I was reminded of this story
last week when the father of an alumnus told me how he left in the middle of
a pivotal conference attended by the President, in order to sit at the
deathbed of his best friend. The suffering of death is unfortunately the way of
the world. The candles we light through our own acts of compassion are what
will help us get through the darkness and the cold, until spring arrives
again.
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Hanukkah Sameach and have a warm winter,
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Mishael
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