The Essence of Chanukah:Torah She’Baal Peh (Oral Torah):
Revised 12/12/09:
On this web site I often will write about things having to with my new found orthodox jewish lifestyle. Currently, I do spend a significant part of my day, typically several hours ad day learning Torah @ Passaic Torah Institute. In my humility I can indeed point out that I do become very motivated to learn in part due to the constant urging of Rabbi Shlomo Singer. However I am also intrinsically hard wired to delve deeply into things, to get to heart of any given matter.
If I state that this article was inspired by a series of discourses which were given at Passaic Torah Institute, at 441 Passaic Ave, Passaic NJ, and were lead by Rabbi Shlomo Singer shlita, then I can avoid the possible pitfall of attributing my own personal take on the matter to someone other than myself. I can also avoid potential criticism from my teacher by leaving out some of the essential ingredients which were developed over the series of discourses, over time.
The ongoing interactive discourse began sometime in late November, 2009 continuing through today (one day before Chanukah) December 10, 2009.
On more than one occasion Rabbi Shlomo Singer had asked our small but consistent group of about 5- 7 chevrah (friends), what was the main idea, or the essence of Chanukah. We all gave our answers and were individually recognized for having some good ideas and insights, however it was clear that our Rabbi was clearly steering us in a particular direction. The essence of Chanukah is Torah She’Baal Peh (Oral Torah).
The salient point left out of this original piece is that on some level, according to the concept as developed by R. Singer shlita, that the Greeks allowed Jews to have our written Torah. However the Greek concept of allowing us to have our written Torah was more like simply allowing a person to read an interesting novel. Certainly the Greeks were not happy to sit still and allow places such as Yeshivah’s to flourish where people would become engaged in extensive discussions regarding different potential interpretations of our Holy Torah.
I need to add the particular image which had been in my mind from as far back as I can remember as a grade school child, a secular Jew who attended public school as a child pick a year anywhere from say second grade to 6th grade. The Chanukah dreidal application image that was firmly implanted in my mind was that a given group of adult male Jews (say between 3 to 5) would somehow have this Torah scroll, I imagined it might have been kept under something and covered up when not being used, and it would be taken out so that it could be studied. Now when a Greek (or Roman) soldier, some fellow in full Roman type armor, complete with that classic sort of brush type helmet, happened to be anywhere in earshot or line of sight, these regular Jews of the day would hurriedly scurry the Torah scroll away into its secret hiding place, and take out a dreidel, and throw out some coins from their pocket and then act as if they were in the middle of a dreidel game just in case the Roman soldier might have thought that these fellows were studying Torah.
Roman Helmet (cotume store image) 200 BCE
Now, I am not sharing this idea with any particular pride, however this would be the working image, until something more sophisticated (A greek based word from sophists- Greeks who somehow made a living by teaching philosophy) image or concept might come along to replace this one.
Therefore when Rabbi Singer repeatedly kept beating the drum how it was Oral Torah, that the Greeks were trying to eliminate, that the idea simply was not being put concretely into my head. After at this particular time period there were no books called Gemara, Talmud, or Mishna. As far as I know, back then there was Torah, and that was it!
So now try to understand my dilemma when I kept hearing the Rabbi Singer say that: The Essence of Chanukah is Torah She’Baal Peh (Oral Torah).
Now there were days that I sat there kind of just listening, and wondering if we were ever going to hear why this was true. There were days, that I got so engrossed in learning new concepts, that it was becoming difficult to keep of with all the ideas that were being expounded upon. There were times where it seemed like our Rabbi Singer was reading Hebrew word after Hebrew word from the Sefer (book) we were reading ”Siftei Chaim” by Rabbi Chaim Friedlander. There were days where it seemed like our Rabbi was repeating the same ideas over and over again.
Rabbi Singer asked us questions, we gave answers. He liked our answers, we liked our answers but the questions kept coming at us. Different questions, about different ideas. Rabbi Singer sometimes asked us questions, and nobody would speak, thinking maybe it was a rhetorical question. Then he would ask us the same question again, sometimes he would give us the answer, and dramatically bang on the table. ” Do you like my answer? Is it okay with you? Are you going to let me go on? ” Rabbi Singer would often ask us, challenging us to think for ourselves, question him, argue with him, or perhaps even agree with him. Sometimes someone would chyme in, and sometimes we would sit there and wait because very often Rabbi Singer would tell us even more, or give us a deeper insight to think about after such a series of questions.
I would sit, and I would listen. On a good day, i would have a pen, and scramble around to find a few scraps of paper that were not filled with Hebrew words, words from the Gemara (the written oral Torah) which always seemed to be floating around Passaic Torah Institue (PTI). On an even better day I would have my marble composition notebooks with me. During the best, of the best, of these days, I would let go of trying to answer all the questions, and would simply do my best to keep with what Rabbi Singer was asking us, or reading from our source text.
I realize that part of the way Rabbi Singer imparts information is using the Socratic method (a Greek work for a particular teaching method-Socratic method based on Socrates 470-399 BCE- a Greek philosopher where information is elicited by the teacher by repeated questioning of the student).
Also I understand that there was a very strong tradition of Oral Torah which had been in existence prior to the writing down of this information in Mishna and Gemara. As a matter fact part of the Oral Tradition of Torah She’Baal Peh, as is implied by it’s name, actually prohibited the writing down of this information in the form of books.
Also, for better or worse, my first formal entry in the world of Torah learning (some 15 or so years ago-having never even been exposed to Hebrew school when I was in grade school or in junior high school) had happened to be from the point of view of Kabbalistic ideas. One of the ideas of Kabbalah is that some ideas, or secrets are not supposed to ever be put into writing. Indeed as per Halacha, some ideas are never even supposed to be talked about even in a group as small as two people. The idea here is that one could only bring up chapter headings or the main idea without filling in the details.
Now lets get back to Chanukah::
We emphasize the (seemingly small and unimportant) miracle of the oil lasting 8 days, as the primary important thing and then add our thanks to Hashem for the miracles of the military victory of such a small number of Yeshivah students over at minimum 10′s of thousands of trained military soldiers, or to use Rabbi Singer’s number, 6 million Greek soldiers.
It really is no small wonder that Chanukah may be one of the most enigmatic of the Jewish holidays. On hand we have some relatively easy requirements that we must satisfy in order to observe the holiday correctly. For example, lighting candles, how difficult is that to do when compared to the kind of cleaning that we as orthodox Jews must do in order to remove all the chametz (bread, and bread products) from the household in preparation for Pesach.
However the mitzvot (commandments) associated with Pesach are defined in the written Torah, while Chanukah is a holiday which came to be after the time period of the Torah, shortly before the destruction of the second temple. Now I should point out here that my belief regarding R. Singer’s discourse on the essence of Chanukah is Torah She’Baal Peh, is not simply because the mitzvahs associated with Chanukah, and the description of how to keep Chanukah are given outside the time period where the total body of literature which was to be encoded into Tanach. In other words:
According to the Talmud,[2] much of the contents of the Tanakh were compiled by the “Men of the Great Assembly” by 450 BCE, and have since remained unchanged”
The source of statement above is wikipedia.org/wiki/Tanakh
The point that I am trying to make here is that my understanding is that the essence of Chanukah is about Oral Torah, not because Oral Torah is required in order to provide the details and the rules about how to celebrate the holiday of Chanukah. Rather the essence of Chanukah is Torah She’Baal Peh (Oral Torah), because having an accurate written and kosher Torah Scroll is not enough to keep the nation of Jewish people a distinct and separate Jewish nation. Indeed there must be such things as communities of Torah observant Jews who seek to follow the code of Jewish law both in its written form and in its oral form. In order for there to be any understanding of how to apply the Oral law of Torah, to each subsequent generation of Jewish people there must be a strong tradition to continue to learn and transmit oral law to subsequent generations. Simply writing down oral law down in some book that sits on someone’s shelf, is not enough to keep the oral tradition alive.
Why Chanukah is such an important holiday:
It is easy to be mislead about the significance of Chanukah for a great variety of reasons including the current emphasis on buying toys for children, spinning dreidels giving and eating chocolate coins and eating food prepared in oil, like latkes and jelly donuts. The preparation and mitzvahs associated with the holiday primarily revolve around lighting candles before it gets dark, saying a relatively simple bracha (blessing), adding a few lines to the normal morning, afternoon, and evening prayers, and saying Hallel, which is an additional set of prayers that are usually said on other Jewish holidays where it is fitting to give thanks to Hashem and give praise of Hashem, for the great miracles and for all the good things which Hashem has done and continues to do for us.
If one considers the elaborate preparation required to properly celebrate a holiday such as Sukkot for example there is no question that Chanukah is a cake walk! Yet, we celebrate the holiday for eight days. Why not just for one day? Rabbi S. Singer shlita tells us, yes, somehow it is the 1st time we light the candle on the 1st night, it should be good enough to advertise the miracle. Yes, thats right to advertise the miracle. It is a mitzvah (a commandmant, not a good deed) to place the Chanukah Menorah in a window so that everyone could see. We are specifically told by our Rabbis to make known the miracle that occurred about 150 years before the destruction of the second temple.
Are we specifically reminding the whole world about the miraculous military victory where about one dozen yeshivah students took on and defeated the entire Greek army? No, of course not. We do not celebrate military victories, as religious holidays because, military victories involve death and bloodshed. Instead and more properly so, our Rabbis instituted Chanukah as a way to memorialize a tiny subtle miracle that occurred in the second temple. I have long wondered about this because on the surface celebrating the miracle of the oil lasting for eight days may not seem like such a great and important miracle.
In my humble opinion the above paragraph touches on the essential fact of our Chanukah celebration. The seemingly small and insignificant act of quietly lighting candles in our homes on Chanukah (just like we light candles in our homes once a week at night upon the commencement of shabbos) is an act that is very dear to Hashem.
After all when the Greeks had thoroughly defiled and corrupted our Bayis Sheini (the second temple) they had also outlawed three things, and one of those three things was shabbos observance. The Greeks also outlawed the bris milah (the mitzvah to circumcise a baby boy on the 8th day after his birth). The Greeks outlawed Rosh Chodesh, a mitzvah that was given in our Torah, which recognizes the new moon which helps us along with our Jewish calendar to recognize the entire the various times of the year, which allows us to properly fix the dates and the commencement of all of the Jewish holidays, at their proper time.
On the surface one might be lead to believe, hey maybe the Greek occupation was not such a terrible thing. Indeed when we look at the numbers of Jews today who have the religious freedom to stay true to the ways and the traditions that were given to us the Jewish people by Hashem yisborach. This kind of reasoning results from the very large portion of today’s Jewish nation. When the freedom to follow one’s religion is believed to be a given, then what may happen is that individuals, and then entire communities may become unaware when these G-d given rights become slowly and subtly infringed upon.
After all the Greeks were not out to wipe us, the Jewish nation, entirely off the face of the earth (chas v’shalom). No, indeed they even enjoyed our written Torah so much that they even had our Rabbis of the day, translate the Torah into a language that they could understand. Very simply they only tried strip the Jew of every thing which is unique to the Jew. That is to say through their specific decrees they were seeking to destroy essential elements of the Jewish people as a whole. They had no problem with allowing us to live, eat, sleep, work, have children, homes, wealth, and independence.
Indeed the decrees that were inflicted upon us might seem to be so very minor to the vast majority of Jews today. One could see how so many Jews did indeed simply go along with these decrees and live their lives, in peace as Hellenized Jews.
The Hellenized Jews represented the 1st breach in wall with the potential to wipe out not the physical bodies of the Jewish nation, but rather the destruction of the very heart and soul of the Jewish nation.
In conclusion it is not the grand and great miracle of the military victory where the 12 yeshivah students prevailed over the entire Greek war machine. No, the essence of Chanukah is the small miracle in which helped us re-establish ourselves as a Jewish People after the spiritual assault upon us by the Greek army and Greek culture. It is the re-dedication of the bayis sheni (second Temple) and the miracle of finding a small flask of of pure oil in the second temple which had been throughly and completely defiled by The Greeks.
The divine grace that was bestowed upon the Jewish people was a response that was elicited from Hashem yisborach, because of the action of twelve righteous souls who acted with the extreme of self sacrifice. These righteous Jews acted with alacrity at a dark time in Jewish history, where to do nothing would have resulted in (chas v’shalom) in the extinction of the Jewish nation. In the time of the 1st temple, the Jewish nation received so much divine grace that it was taken for granted. During the time period of the second temple, the Hellenization of the Jews may have started as a subtle and relatively benign act.
The nearly insane actions of twelve righteous Jews, who had the holy chutzpah to stand up to the entire Greek military regime was the very thing that initiated a miracle to come down from Shamayim on two fonts. The huge miracle that could be seen by all, how twelve righteous Jews defeated the entire Greek Army. The subtle and silent miracle witnessed by the Levites who were restoring the purity of the second temple. The miracle of Chanukah (like Purim) was a miracle which was initiated by by just a few individuals who were zealous in their belief and in their actions. They overcame whatever personal fear they may have felt, and were rewarded with a victory which would not have been possible if G-d would not have performed a miracle for the Jewsih nation in their merit. Likewise before G-d saw that there was still one small remnant of Kedusha in those 12 righteous souls, Hashem provided the small and subtle miracle that the Levites could restore the previously thoroughly defiled holy temple to its original state of purity by providing one pure flask of oil, that would miraculously last seven times longer then it could have lasted without miraculous assistance from Shamayim.
The mitzvah that is precious to Hashem yisborach (may his name be blessed) is the small mitzvah when the family gathers together in the early evening in the privacy of our homes to light the Chanukah candles. The essence of Chanukah is about the quality of The Jewish neshoma (soul). That the Jewish people (like the temple) had become so fallen and so thoroughly corrupted, yet a small quantity of people (12 tzadikim-righteous people) like the small quantity of oil (one flask of pure oil with the proper seal), was enough to restore the kedusha (holiness) to the second temple, and bring back the Shechinah (G-d’s femine aspect and spiritual presence) to the second temple.
Just like the small quantity of righteous tzadikim were sufficient with G-d’s help to withstand the onslaught of the entire Greek army, likewise the small quantity of pure oil which was miraculously found in the aftermath of the war when the Levites (members of the Jewish tribe of Levi, who were in charge or all temple related functions) sought to re-dedicate the Holy temple, was enough to last for eight days, (long enough to restore ritual purity to one who had become ritually defiled by contact with the dead-seven days and one day to make pure oil from olives) so that more pure oil could be produced.
Chanukah- the miracle that Hashem yisborach helped us, by extending the effectiveness of the small quantity of pure oil, which we found in the completely defiled second temple in the aftermath of the Chanukah battle , to last eight days, so that we could keep the light of the Menorah lit in the second temple, and thereby restore purity to the second temple and allow Hashem’s Shechinah to dwell amongst us.
Today, Chanukah 5770, we do not have the Beis Hamikdash. However when we go to our home and light the Chanukah Menorah in our homes with our families, we can have the kevanah (devotion, meditation, keeping our mind, thoughts and heart upon G-d) that we are doing this mitzvah because it is precious to Hashem yisborach. That we are as frum yidden (as a small number of people with yiras shmayim- a jewish nation) have the capacity by properly keeping the mitzvot with pure heart and intentions, have the ability to bring down the glory of the Schechinah, and bring the revelation of Meshiach and the rebuilding of the Beis Hamikdash speedily in our day.
Amen.
Aharon Moshe (Stephen) Sanders
Feel free to share my writngs at your shabbos table or with others. My words in their entirety are my own, other than the brief excerpts which have been properly attributed to their sources. This original essay is protected by copyright, however one may use brief passages as a long as a link back to this web site is provided. I am also grateful to Rabbi Shlomo Singer- shlita, who helped me learn much of the content of this essay, along with his gentle urgings to actually record my thought and ideas in a cohesive written format.
December 11, 2009
Erev Chanukah 5770
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