It’s Chanukah time – time to gather with friends and family and light the Chanukiah (the Chanukah Menorah). Who doesn’t love watching the lights grow over the week, from a lone candle (well…2 candles, if we include the shamash) to a full Chanukiah lighting up the room? That last night especially is such a beautiful, joyous time.
You may not know that it almost didn’t happen that way. Two thousand years ago, there was a debate between the great sages, Hillel and Shammai, about the proper way to handle the Chanukah lights. Shammai held that the proper procedure was to light a full Chanukiah on the first night and then remove one candle each successive night. His logic seems to have been that, by doing it this way, we can emulate the original miracle of Chanukah; the menorah in the Temple started with a full supply of oil, and slowly, slowly burned it down, until there was none left on the eighth day. So too, our own Chanukah lamps.
Hillel, Shammai’s constant adversary, thought that we should instead do what we do now – start with 1 light on the first night, and then add one more each night. His reasoning was different from Shammai’s, though – he was less interested in simulating the past than in symbolizing the future. He said that we should never decrease holiness, only increase it.
We should never decrease holiness, only increase it. That would make a heck of a mission statement for Judaism, no?
So often, maybe every day, arguably every single moment, we’re given a choice between a path which will increase the holiness of our world (maybe only ever so slightly, but still making it holier) or decreasing it. We can act with kindness or with selfishness. We can attend to suffering or ignore it. We can mark a moment with a ritual or let it pass into oblivion.
Chanukah is a reminder that we are constantly faced with that decision, and that there is always a right answer. Do what increases the holiness in our lives, and in our world. Never decrease it. And then, our world will truly be filled with light. And miracles.
This column is published as a public service by the Jewish Press in cooperation with the Tampa Rabbinical Association, which assigns the column on a rotating basis. The views expressed are those of the rabbi and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Jewish Press or the TRA.
