Hanukkah arrives during the darkest days of Kislev, adding joy and warmth to the season – United Hebrew Congregation Terre Haute

The recently concluded week before Thanksgiving gave my Ohio family the opportunity to fly out of town and reunite with relatives on the East Coast for both a simcha (joyous celebration) and an unveiling ceremony (memorial following the one-year anniversary of the death of my beloved Aunt Becky).

With gratitude for sharing those occasions with family, my thoughts shifted to the month of Kislev, which brings preparations for Hanukkah.

Although we prepare for the joy of Hanukkah during this time, we experience a reduction of light in our days, which evokes somber emotions.

As winter approaches, each day becomes colder and darker, and the change can be disconcerting. Although we prepare for the joy of Hanukkah during this time, we experience a reduction of light in our days, which evokes somber emotions.

We look forward to the traditional latkes (potato pancakes) or sufganiot (fried donuts), festive songs and feelings of warmth and comfort that the season brings. We celebrate the joy of a home with loved ones, but we also commemorate the history of our ancient Temple that after being destroyed was rededicated. We search for value and meaning in these moments.

Adam fasted for eight days

Yes, the month of December can evoke complicated emotions. Our days grow shorter, and with less daylight, our mood can slump. Jewish oral tradition (Babylonian Talmud: Avodah Zarah 8a) teaches a midrash about how the original human, Adam, reacted when the days got shorter:

…he said, ‘Woe is me! Perhaps because I have sinned, the world around me is darkening and returning to its state of chaos and confusion; this, then, is the kind of death to which I have been sentenced from heaven!’ So he began observing an eight-day fast. But as he noticed the winter equinox and noted the day getting increasingly longer, he said, ‘This is the world’s course,’ and he set forth to keep an eight-day festival. In the following year he appointed them as festivals.

This midrash shares an ancient understanding that predates the stories of the Maccabees and the rededication of the Temple that Hanukkah (also eight days!) commemorates.

Rabbi Hillel lit the candles

The story acknowledges the natural human distress that accompanies the loss of daylight.
Perhaps when the argument of Judaism’s great sage, Rabbi Hillel, was accepted as the norm — that we should light an additional candle each night of Hanukkah, going from one candle the first night up to eight candles on the last night — this midrash was a factor.

The sages of our tradition recognized that adding light (and adding joy and warmth to our days) rather than diminishing the light (a different argument) was more in line with what we need this time of year.

The sages of our tradition recognized that adding light (and adding joy and warmth to our days) rather than diminishing the light (a different argument) was more in line with what we need this time of year.

May the light in our homes increase even these days when the sun’s light is in shorter supply. May we be thankful for the miracles of this season before and after we celebrate Hanukkah.