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November 29, 2002
Eclectic traditions for Chanukah
A relay race from the Maccabees' graves in Modi'in to Mt. Zion
is just one interesting aspect of Chanukah.
BENITA BAKER SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH BULLETIN
This time of year, just prior to Christmas, can be an awkward time
of year for Jews. Let's face it. How many times have we found ourselves
in situations where we clumsily explain our Jewish holiday. So maybe
we overcompensate with presents and get caught up in "the spirit
of the season" but we also know that Chanukah is so much more
than a Jewish response to a world obsessed with Christmas.
The real meaning of Chanukah, which starts this year on the evening
of Nov. 29, is not about giving presents. It is about celebrating
heroism, courage and religious freedom. And when it comes to heroes
and holiday symbols, Judah Maccabee far surpasses Santa Claus as
a role model.
The spirit and meaning of Chanukah took on new meaning when Israel
became a state. The early Israeli settlers saw themselves as modern-day
Maccabees and they rallied around the symbolism of Chanukah. Nowadays,
on the first day of Chanukah, athletes gather at the Maccabees'
graves in Modi'in. They light a torch there and begin a relay race,
handing it off from one to another, until the torch arrives in Jerusalem
where the president lights the menorah at the presidential palace.
The torch is also taken to Mount Zion, where it lights menorot in
memory of Holocaust victims.
The traditional Chanukah food in Israel are sufganiyot, fried
jelly-filled doughnuts. In 1997, near the Israeli town of Afula,
a12-foot-high pyramid consisting of 6,400 sufganiyot was erected
in an attempt to get into the Guinness Book of Records. In
an equally remarkable undertaking that same year, a 60-foot-tall
menorah, weighing 17 metric tons, was built in the town of Latrun.
Each night of the holiday, a rabbi was lifted by crane to light
the candles.
Menorot in public places and public candle-lighting ceremonies are
becoming more prevalent throughout the world. In their zealous attempt
to reach out to Jews and spread the message of religious freedom,
the Lubavitch are behind many of these ceremonies. This is the 13th
year that the Canadian Friends of Chabad Lubavitch have organized
a menorah-lighting ceremony on Parliament Hill. Lighting the National
Menorah in Washington is an occasion attended even by the U.S. president.
In New York City's Central Park, the Lubavitch Youth Organization
lights a menorah 32 feet high.
As they have done with other Jewish holidays, communities throughout
the world and throughout time have given meaning to Chanukah with
their own unique rituals and customs. In a Sephardi home only the
head of the household lights the Chanukah candles. Contrary to the
Ashkenazi way, the shamash is lit last and is not used to light
the other candles.
Jews from the Syrian town of Aleppo light an extra shamash candle
every night of Chanukah as a gesture of thanks to their country
for giving a home to their ancestors when they were expelled from
Spain. Turkish Jews make candles from the flax fibres used to wrap
the etrog from Sukkot. The remains of these Chanukah candles are
then melted together to make another candle used to search for bread
crumbs on Passover.
Many Sephardi Chanukah traditions focus on children and on charity.
In Kurdistan and Iraq, children would make an effigy of Antiochus
and carry it from door to door collecting food donations. The effigy
is thrown into a bonfire on the last day of Chanukah. Children in
Yemen are given a coin each day to buy sugar and a red powder that
is used to make a wine-like beverage which they drink at a giant
evening feast.
Chanukah has special meaning for Sephardi women. For them, the heroes
of Chanukah are Hannah, who watched her seven sons die because they
would not bow down to idols, and Judith, who severed the head of
the cruel Greek ruler, causing the enemy soldiers to flee. In their
honor, women do not work while the Chanukah candles are lit. Instead
of eating foods fried in oil, Sephardim eat dairy food to remember
that Judith defeated the Greek tyrant because she fed him cheese
and wine until he fell asleep.
Since Chanukah is not a holy day, some Jews do not to celebrate
it all. Ethiopians did not know about Chanukah until they immigrated
to Israel. In Soviet Russia, lighting candles was a conspicuous
religious act that few Jews would risk. Even if they wanted to celebrate
Chanukah, it was against the law to manufacture and sell candles.
No account of holiday traditions would be complete without a heart-warming
story about celebrations during the Holocaust. In 1943, the inmates
at Bergen-Belsen were determined to celebrate Chanukah. The men
saved scraps of fat from their food rations to make candles and
the women pulled threads from their clothes and twisted them into
wicks. Half of a raw potato became the menorah. This courageous
act honoring the courageous acts of our ancestors must have given
them strength and hope. That is the essence of Chanukah.
Benita Baker is a freelance writer living in Nepean, Ont.
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