Hanukkah

 

By calendrical coincidence the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah 5785 (in the Christian calendar 2024) coincides with Christmas this year, having begun at sundown on Christmas Day and ending next week on January 2. 

Obviously I do not personally celebrate Hanukkak or any other Jewish holiday. But I well remember how when I was a pupil in a New York public school in 1954, my class sort-of celebrated Hanukkah. We had a chalk menorah on the blackboard, and we used to illuminate in chalk one of its “lights” each day. (Sadly, I suspect such inter-religious experiences are probably not permitted in public schools anymore!) 

Hanukkah, as most people presumably know, is based on events recounted in the (Catholic) Old Testament in the two Books of Maccabees, which describe the horrendous suffering inflicted upon the people of Israel by their Hellenistic persecutors and the contrastingly heroic history of resistance led by Judas Maccabeus and his priestly Hasmonean dynasty, who eventually defeated the Gentiles, reconquered the Jerusalem Temple which had been desecrated, and festively rededicated it for sacrificial worship on the 25th of Kislev (December 14, 164 B.C.)

 

Famously, Jewish tradition has amplified the account in Maccabees with the story of how, when they sought to light the Temple's the seven-branch candelabrum (menorah), they found just a one-day supply of olive oil that had escaped contamination by the Greeks. Miraculously, that one-day supply burned for eight days, until new oil could be prepared under ritually pure conditions. Thus, the holiday's famous ritual of the nightly lighting of the special Hanukkah menorah - one lamp or candle on the first night, two on the second, etc., until all eight lights have been lit. 

 

We can assume that Jesus observed Hanukkah. The Gospel of John - the New Testament book most attuned to the Jewish liturgical calendar - specifically mentions both the festival and Jesus' presence in the Jerusalem Temple: The feat of the Dedication was then taking place in Jerusalem. It was winter. And Jesus walked about in the temple area on the Portico of Solomon (John 10:22-23). It was during that celebration of Hanukkah that Jesus gave his famous “Good Shepherd” discourse.

 

Even beyond explicitly religious observance Hanukkah’s popularity seems deeply rooted. A 1960s radical friend of mine once told me how his socialist, religiously non-observant family celebrated no Jewish holidays – with the one exception of Hanukkah, which his socialist father considered a people’s holiday. 

Meanwhile, The restoration of the State of Israel and the repeated challenges to Israel’s existence and the Jewish people’s survival in their land has also obviously given renewed salience to Hanukkah, which originated, after all, as a recollection of the last sustained experience of Jewish independence prior to 1948. With the 20th-century restoration of Israel as a Jewish state, the holiday's original historical significance has, naturally enough, undergone a revival, and both the Jewish theme of national liberation and the universal theme of cultural and religious freedom have moved to center stage. Religiously, this patriotic holiday, rooted in Israel's struggle against a secularizing political establishment, also simultaneously celebrates God's miraculously abiding presence among his people.

 

This year, the current threats to Israel from Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran, and the widespread increase in expressions of antisemitism all around the world (including in the U.S.), highlight the relevance of Hanukkah for Israel, for Jews everywhere, and for all people of good will who support the survival of the Jewish people against contemporary enemies every bit as implacable as Antiochus IV. 

 

For Jews, of course, Hanukkah has its own integrity and fullness of meaning apart from any Christian glosses. For Christians, however, God’s intervention in history to save his people and God's abiding presence with his people (signified by the Temple and, more immediately, by the miracle of the oil) are Hanukkah themes which can also resonate readily with the Christmas story. For the Incarnation is, after all, the fulfillment of God's ancient promise to save his people, which he does by becoming present among us in his Son's humanity. And like the miracle of the oil, the Incarnation has a modest, ordinary appearance. 

 

Just as the Hanukkah story contrasts the monstrous pomposity of the Hellenistic king and his elite collaborators with the more powerful simplicity of God's powerful will to save his people, so too for Christians the Christmas story contrasts the pretentiously false power of pagan emperors, kings, and governors (Augustus, Herod, Quirinius) with the divine power of the Word-made-flesh, in whom God's great visitation of the world he created continues. Meanwhile, the Hanukkah story reminds us that, despite historical and contemporary obstacles, the divine presence, symbolized by the long-burning oil, continues in his people Israel, for the gifts and call of God are irrevocable (Romans 11:29).

Photo: Lighting the large menorah near the Ellipse, close to the White House, The New York Times.