Neither Miracle Nor Metaphor, It’s Just Who We Are
For a holiday that celebrates a military victory, it’s safe to say that after what happened in Australia, we probably all feel a bit defeated.
After all, there have been too many such days the last few years, not to mention the last few centuries, all equally dispiriting. Okay, saddening and infuriating, too.
What Israel and Jews around the world are up against really does underscore what a miracle it was that the Maccabees were able to defeat the baddest army in the world.
But needless to point out, that’s not why we light the menorah or eat fried food. The main miracle of course was that one day’s worth of oil managed to burn for eight until more could be produced.
We take that part of the story literally, as if it were a fact of history. Actually, in many respects it is. Chanukah, as well as Purim, occurred after the Biblical age. The Jewish people really did win a war over the Assyrian Greeks, who really did defile the Beit ha Mikdash, the great Temple. The holiday is considered rabbinic rather than having been brought down by the Torah like the rest.
The oil lasting then isn’t a simple metaphor such as the Jewish people never gave out the entire time, or inspired poetic symbolism that the fire inside needed to keep fighting remained burning. Maybe it should be a metaphor, because it’s a pretty excellent one.
The thing about Chanukah, or any Jewish holiday for that matter, is that we celebrate it with the benefit of hindsight. We know how the story ends. We know that somehow, year after year, that eighth candle will get lit.
Except that the real beauty of the Chanukah story is that the Maccabees didn’t. They first had to believe they could win against all odds, and after they did and reentered and consecrated the Temple, they and the rest of the Jewish people then had to hope the oil would last. And hope, and hope, and keep hoping.
And the thing is, so do we.
That’s not to say that this ridiculous wave of antisemitism will end a week from now. Far from it. As much as we dream and pray for it, it would be naïve to imagine that after 3000 years of being persecuted from Australia to Austria, and everywhere in between, that Jewish life will ever be any other way.
We are under no illusion as to what the future will bring, but we’re not resigned to it. It’s a lot like what the Maccabees must have felt. We know the odds are against us but we keep fighting, and in this case, lighting. Chanukah always occurs right on the cusp of the winter solstice to remind us that even in the darkest times, we’ll make it through.
A year from now, we know there will be millions of Jews around the world celebrating another Chanukah. We just know it. Somehow, the fire inside to remain Jewish and have faith in who we are and what we stand for, despite what happened in Australia, or at Nova, or in Germany, or ancient Israel, can never be extinguished.
Like I said, it’s a good metaphor.
The tragic thing about what happened in Australia is that the menorah is supposed to be intentionally lit visibly from the outside as an act of defiance.
Whether you’re religious or not, you have to respect these brave rabbis for willing to risk their lives to show the world that no matter how outsized, we continue to march forward through the public squares of the world, on the floor of the UN, as well as in time, carrying forward this ancient tradition of lighting a fire our enemies can see so that they know they haven’t won, and never will.
The Chanukah miracle being that the menorah remained lit makes it all too easy to say that these days, no less a miracle is that we’re willing to light at all. Though it’s just not true, that we still light or keep any such tradition, or have any sense of a Jewish identity, isn’t a miracle whatsoever.
Maybe this is who we’ve always been, the people who survived Egypt, the Babylonians, Persians, Romans and the Europeans. That fight, that underdog spirit, is in our DNA. We like to talk about tradition, but our endurance and resilience may be our greatest.
As we continue to celebrate this Chanukah in the memory of all who were lost, it’s not that we remember the Maccabees, but must realize that we are all Maccabees. That’s not a miracle. It’s just who we are.
