The Great Yet Little Applied Lesson of Chanukah

Last week, as we were about to enter the Jewish Holy Day of Chanukah, I wrote an article about miracles. For many, and unfortunately so, I might add, Chanukah begins and ends with the miracle of the can of oil that lasted eight days when it should have sufficed for one day only.

A beautiful and cheerful story indeed which merely tells us why the holiday lasts eight days but not why we celebrate it. The second “why” is one of the most important lessons in our Jewish history, a lesson we seem to have forgotten.

For me, and many others, Chanukah is about the Jews taking over and shaping their own destiny. It is about Jews and ONLY Jews defining who we are and what our tradition, its symbols and concept are all about.

As during the times of the Maccabees, nowadays we also have Hellenizing Jews. Yes, I am talking about those Jews who lack a backbone, appease and cater to those who they believe can save them, little realizing that in many cases, those who claim to love us, are merely doing it in pursuit of their own agenda be it political, religious or economic ones.

Some of us call it, the “Ghetto mentality,” the kind Jews had been forced to adopt while living  under the rule of foreigners for a very long time. In Yiddish, there is a special term for it, the “Sha Shtil,” (be quiet) mentality.

These Jews who possess and practice such a mindset will go out of their way to please those they feel may give them a sense of security or a longer life sentence. They will let them usurp their most treasured symbols, allow them to define them and let them advocate for them wherever threats to Jewish existence lurk - all in the name of gaining and buying safety for one day longer.

Funny, because all around us, we see the opposite is happening. Minorities, be it people of colour, members of indigenous nations or anyone else, are offended and rightfully so, should an outsider engage in efforts to define them or usurp any of their symbols.

However, should a Jew “dare” to stand and speak up against such endeavours by others to do the same to us, they get chastised, blocked, offended and are subject to witch hunts.

I bet those members of our People whose blood has filled the rivers of history are probably turning in their graves witnessing and wondering if Jews have learned any lessons from their untimely death

Is that what was the fabric of our destiny when we entered nationhood? Were we meant to be followers rather than leaders? Was that the purpose of establishing a Jewish state in our ancient Homeland, merely to allow it to be conquered physically and ideologically?

Whatever happened to Jewish pride, the kind that the Maccabees restored, “in those days at this time?” What happened to their defiant Spirit or the Spirit of the heroes of Metzada? How about the vigor of the warriors of the Warsaw Ghetto or the Jewish partisans who fought in the forests of Europe against the Nazis? How about the essence of the members of the underground movements, in the years that preceded the establishment of the Jewish state, to whom we owe our presence here in Eretz Yisrael?

Let us bring it back!

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