The Menorah, Part 3: Rabbis vs. Maccabees, Light vs. Fire

The traditional menorah, or Chanukiyah in modern Hebrew, has eight branches in a line (plus one shamash that is not in that line). The biblical and ecological reasons for this are important and discussed in Part 2, and they align with rabbinic legends and stories. They all point to one conclusion: for the rabbis, Chanukah is a festival of light, and not a festival of fire.

A festival of fire

THE RABBIS TAUGHT that the candles or oil lamps of the Menorah must not overlap like the flames of a m’durah, a campfire or bonfire. Rather, each day’s new candle, that symbolizes the number of days tbe oil was burning, must be separated from the ones that came before.

But the Maccabees’ books have nothing to say about a miracle of light burning for eight days. Instead, their festival was davka about fire, not about light. In fact, the second book of Maccabees (which is not in our Bible but was preserved by the church) calls Chanukah “the festival of fire.”

It explains that when the first Temple was destroyed, the priests who were sent into exile hid fire from the altar in a cave and sealed it off. When the exiles came back from Babylonia 70 years later, Nehemiah sent the descendants of those priests to find the fire that was hidden years before. They found the cave, and inside they found a thick liquid, which they spread on the altar on the 25^th of Kislev, hundreds of years before the Maccabees (2 Macc 1:18-36).

As soon as the sun came out, the liquid ignited. That was the miracle, says 2 Maccabees, rather than an eight-day-long burn of one-day’s oil. And not only that: 2 Maccabees also says we are commemorating the fire that came down from heaven when Solomon dedicated the altar of the first Temple. That dedication happened over the seven days of Sukkot and Sh’mini Atseret, the eighth day, when fire fell from heaven, hundreds of years before. That fire is what created the flame passed down by the priests through the generations and then hidden.

2 Maccabees also doubles down on the symbolism of the eight days, explaining that the festival of fire was a redo of the eight days of Sukkot, because Sukkot couldn’t be celebrated during the war. That makes two explanations in 2 Maccabees for why Chanukah is about fire, and two for why it needed to be eight-days long. No mention of the rabbinic story that the oil burned eight days.

Not only that, but 1 Maccabees describes several incidents in the war where the Maccabee forces chased their enemies into a tower and burned it down (and the Greeks did the same). We call that a war crime, but for them it was a great triumph.

Festival of fire or festival of light?

RABBINIC AND MACCABEAN explanations for Chanukah involve fire – but not the same kind of fire. For the rabbis, Chanukah was a festival of lights, chag urim, in the plural, celebrating the fire of the Temple menorah, where the flames were also plural, and not “like a m’durah.” The Hasmoneans, however, saw Chanukah as a celebration of a different fire, the fire of the altar. (“Hasmonean” comes from the family name of Judah the Maccabee.) That fire was by definition a m’durah – a cookfire or campfire, kindled to be used either to burn up a sacrificial animal’s meat in smoke or to cook it for eating by the priests. That fire, lit form wood, not from olive oil, cast a bright light and deep shadows and radiated heat, like a campfire would.

The flame of a ner, an oil lamp or candle (which is the root of the word menorah), is kindled for illumination, not for heat. The seven branches of the menorah in the Temple faced the altar, so that the menorah did not cast sharp shadows (like an O-ring light for zoom).  The rabbis made a point of this difference, first by saying the flames of the Chanukah menorah could not look like a m’durah, and second by saying that the Chanukah lights were holy and could not be used for any utilitarian purpose (like for cooking or reading). That’s why we have the shamash: to provide light that has not been sanctified and can therefore be used.

Both the rabbinic and Maccabean stories give us an historical reason to celebrate with some form of fire, but they embody opposite intentions. The rabbis’ fire was a celebration of the olive oil of the new harvest, and a recognition of the darkest night of the year, the new moon near to solstice.  The Maccabean-Hasmonean version of Chanukah, on the other hnd, is much closer to how Zionist advocates recast Chanukah in light of the state of Israel.

Who was right? Which and how many quasi-historical fire miracles do we need to conjure up to justify celebrating Chanukah? We could also ask, did the festival really originate in any of these miracle stories? Or is it rooted first in a new moon-solstice celebration of the olive harvest, as discussed in Part 2?

Finding the holy in the darkest year

OUR MENORAH, our Chanukiyah, is not a m’durah, not an attempt to overcome the dark with a blazing fire (davka the opposite of the song Banu Choshekh, discussed in Part 1). Its lights represented neither altar fire nor the fires of war. Instead they were a bridge of light composed of individual flames, like seeds or steps of light. This bridge helps us cross over the darkest night of the sun’s cycle in the Northern hemisphere, the new moon near solstice, without fighting or disrespecting the dark.

If you want to honor both rabbinic and Hasmonean traditions—and if you want to stay warm if you are doing the ritual outside—Jewish law says you can still build a m’durah to use for your shamash. So you can bring out your firepits!

This year, after all, we need all the light we can get, as we pass through this time that is dark in so many more ways than the winter solstice.*** We are in a time in the U.S. when people are gearing up for resistance to anti-immigrant agitation and detention camps for the stranger, and to all kinds of fearsome changes in our legal and political system. We are in a time of war and horrible deaths in Israel and Palestine, and a time when antisemitism has grown so much stronger. And we are in this time confronted more and more with the chaos of climate disruption, which will continue for years to come.

In the holy darkness there is peace, there is freedom. It is darkness that makes our small lights shine brighter.

We may fantasize about joining together to make one big flame. But the menorah teaches us that it is better and enough to align ourselves like the wicks of the menorah, to synchronize how we shine our own light within the darkness, in order to create a path ahead of us without shadows. Just the right light to illuminate our journey.

Chag urim sameach!

A prayer for all 8 nights of Chanukah:

Just as Chanukah marks the turning point in the year from growing darkness to growing light, may it also mark for us this year a turning point from war and killing and curse, toward peace and blessing and hope. May the hostages be returned speedily, may the destruction of Gaza stop, and may there be room for peace and blessing in the land of the promise, from the river to the sea. As the United States government turns to emplacing a new administration, may we be strengthened in our resolve to care for the stranger, to fight for the climate and for all living creatures, to live toward peace and justice. May we protect just laws, and may our resistance to unjust laws or unjust systems be firm. May our hearts be courageous. May our hands be strong. May our work succeed. V’hyi no’am Adonai Eloheinu aleinu, uma’aseh yadeinu kon’na aleinu, uma’aseh yadeinu kon’neyhu.

[Note about using this prayer: Eight qualities are mentioned in the prayer: Peace Blessing Hope Return Promise Strength Life Courage. You can pick one to focus on each night (you can do them in the order they appear in if you like). Where do you find that quality in yourself? Where do you find it in the world? What will a life, or a world, transformed by that quality look like? Feel like? And since the prayer is most deeply about Justice, you might also ask, How can this quality increase justice in the world?]

*** This line was written in 2020 for a COVID version of this article, but it remains all too current now. The original article continued: “We are in a time of people trying to undermine the U.S. election, which we can only hope will end January 20^th. We are in a time when so many are struggling with isolation and anxiety from COVID, as they have been for most of this year. We don’t need to join together and make one big flame, and in any case this year we can’t even if we want to.”