Author Archives: sylviarothschild

6th Elul

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Elul 6 14th August 2021

Gary Larsen, the quirky cartoonist, was born on this day in 1950. His drawings challenge us to see the world differently, wondering what else might be happening just on the edge of consciousness. One of my early favourites was a triptych showing three cows standing on their hind legs in a field near a road. A cow a little further from us calls out “car!” and in the second frame a car drives past the cows grazing happily. The third frame shows the road empty once more and the three cows back on their hind legs chatting.

That sense that there is another possibility just out of view – but not out of reach – is one that we take with us into Elul. We just need the imagination to bring it forth.

Elul 6 14th August 2021

Gary Larsen, the quirky cartoonist, was born on this day in 1950. His drawings challenge us to see the world differently, wondering what else might be happening just on the edge of consciousness. One of my early favourites was a triptych showing three cows standing on their hind legs in a field near a road. A cow a little further from us calls out “car!” and in the second frame a car drives past the cows grazing happily. The third frame shows the road empty once more and the three cows back on their hind legs chatting.

That sense that there is another possibility just out of view – but not out of reach – is one that we take with us into Elul. We just need the imagination to bring it forth.

5th Elul – auditing the ethical accounts

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Elul 5 13th August 2021

Elul is the time for us to do cheshbon nefesh, the accounting of our soul. The language is curious – it feels more like the language of commerce than that of spirituality.  Yet the tradition is replete with such language and metaphor for our spiritual cleansing.

In Pirkei Avot we read “Rabbi (Judah haNasi) said: which is the straight path that a person should choose for themself? One which is an honour to the person adopting it, and [on account of which] honour [accrues] to him from others. And be careful with a light commandment as with a grave one, for you do know not the reward for the fulfilment of the commandments. Also, reckon the loss [that may be sustained through the fulfilment] of a commandment against the reward [accruing] thereby, and the gain [that may be obtained through the committing] of a transgression against the loss [entailed] thereby. Apply your mind to three things and you will not come into the clutches of sin: Know what there is above you: an eye that sees, an ear that hears, and all your deeds are written in a book.” (2:1)

There is a clear sense that our lives become balance sheets, with credit and debit columns that can be examined and checked against us.  Spiritually we can both make profits and losses.

So with this metaphor in mind, Elul is the time for us to look at the balance sheets and make a plan so that next year we will look more spiritually solvent.

What will bring us honour and what will only bring us satisfaction? When we choose our path through the next year, tradition reminds us that there are bigger needs than our own immediate gratification. At some point there will be a reckoning – better to have the annual audit and make our adjustments gradually towards a more honourable life.

For after all, as we also find in Avot (2:15) “The day is short and the work is great, the workers are lazy and the reward is great and the Ruler of the House is insistent”

4th Elul – holy texts holy people

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Elul 4 12th August

On this day in 1553 Pope Julius the third ordered the confiscation and burning of the Talmud.

‘Once these books are removed,’ an advisor to the Roman Inquisition had written, ‘it will soon be that the more that they are without the wisdom of their rabbis, so much more will they be prepared and disposed to receive the Christian faith and,’ what he calls, ‘the wisdom of the word of God.’

The Inquisitors confiscated every copy of the Talmud in Italy; On Rosh Hashanah 5314 (9 September 1553), that the Talmud and many other Jewish books were burnt in the Campo dei Fiori in Rome.

On 12 September 1553 another papal decree was issued, demanding that all copies of the Talmud throughout the Catholic world be gathered and destroyed. In Venice – then the world centre of Hebrew printing  – the order was interpreted to include other Jewish books as well. On Saturday, 21 October 1553 , 3rd Cheshvan 5314 all  the books gathered were burned in Piazza San Marco.

Other Hebrew books were burned in 1568 in Venice.

Throughout the remainder of the sixteenth-century, a complete edition of the Talmud could not be found anywhere in the region.

Later, the printing of Hebrew books was permitted once more, but under censorship. They were checked and licenced by the authorities (licenza dei Superiori)  whose imprimatur can be found in all Hebrew texts printed in Venice from the second half of the 16th century onwards.

The Talmud is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and studying it has shaped Jewish thinking. Those of us who have read a page a day (daf yomi) for the seven and a half years it takes to complete the books  will attest to a change in how the world is perceived. Yet the ideas of a people do not only reside on the printed page, and the burning of their books did not destroy the Jewish people.

Judaism resides in the spirit of the Jewish people. Ideas may be suppressed, people may be martyred, but as Leo Baeck wrote centuries later “A people only dies when its spirit dies”.

On the plaque recording the great burning in Rome there are two quotations. One from the Talmudic story of the martyrdom of Rabbi Hananiah ben Teradion, who, wrapped in a burning torah scroll called out “The parchment is burning but the letters fly up to heaven”, the second from the lamentation Sha’ali Serufah ba-Esh, a kinah by Rabbi Meir of Rothenberg, written in the 13th century after the Disputation of Paris led to the destruction of almost every copy of the Talmud in Europe. The question is directed at the Torah, how can the text given in holy fire be destroyed in worldly fire?  “My question, burned in the fire, about the welfare of mourners” (Sha’ali Serufah ba’Esh, leshalom avelai’ich”

For all that study of our texts has sustained and nourished us, informed and shaped our thinking, allowed us to express our reality and pursue ideas to their sometimes extraordinary conclusions, the texts themselves repeatedly tell us that it is the ideas they embody rather then the physical artefacts that matter. What is given in holy fire cannot be destroyed in worldly fire. It is our interaction and engagement with the ideas of Judaism that keeps our spirit alive, and keeps our people alive.

This coming week, month, year find some texts and engage with them. It can be bible or siddur, Talmud or commentary. Let yourself be touched and changed, discover for yourselves the holy fire.

3rd Elul: invention and reinvention

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Elul 3  11th August

On 11th August 1942, Hollywood actress Hedy Lamarr (called “the most beautiful woman in Hollywood”) received a patent with composer George Antheil for a “frequency hopping, spread-spectrum communication system” designed to make radio-guided torpedoes harder to detect or jam. Lamarr and Antheil made an interesting pair of collaborators. She was an Austrian-born beauty and American film star who practiced electrical engineering when off the movie lot; he was an avant-garde composer, notably of Ballet Mécanique, a score that included synchronized player pianos. The two devised a method whereby a controlling radio and its receiver would jump from one frequency to another, like simultaneous player pianos, so that the radio waves could not be blocked.

The two submitted their patent to the US Navy, which officially opined that Lamarr could do more for the war effort by selling kisses to support war bonds. On one occasion, she raised $7 million. She and Antheil donated their patent to the US Navy and never realized any money from their invention, which would eventually become the basis for wireless phones, Global Positioning Systems, and WiFi, among other cutting-edge technologies.  (from JWA.org)

Hedy Lamarr was born to a comfortable Viennese Jewish family, and in later life she often spoke of her childhood as a kind of paradise, with forest walks and piano lessons, attending the theatre and later herself becoming an actress in theatre and film. She had an extraordinary life, with six husbands and other lovers, a Hollywood career where she was called the most beautiful woman in film and was generally cast as a kind of mysterious temptress, sexually alluring and always somewhat on the outside of normal life. Life followed art, she lived in America and was a film star, but was not of America, and the role-playing of her professional life seems to have been mirrored in her private life.

Hedy Lamarr never told her family that she was born a Jew, that she grew up with Jewish parents. Her own children did not know of that part of her identity even though Hedy’s mother came to live in the United States and they grew up knowing her. Both Lamarr and her mother had converted to Catholicism – Lamarr for marriage in 1933 her mother some five years later. The children found out their maternal background only as adults, when a documentary maker told them of it.

In the month of Elul we  think about our own lives and how we invent and reinvent ourselves, how we try to hide what is inconvenient to our preferred narratives and what we prioritise and why.  While we may not be living a life as complicated and as cryptic as that of Lamarr, each of us have questions to ask ourselves about our choices, and about whether we are living our lives as our best selves.

2nd Elul 5781 We can each do our share in making the world a better place.

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2nd Elul 2021 10 August 

Ruth Bader Ginsburg sworn in United States Supreme Court

On this day in 1993 RBG was sworn in as the second woman – and the first Jewish woman – to serve on the US Supreme Court.

At the time she said “I am a judge born, raised, and proud of being a Jew. The demand for justice runs through the entirety of the Jewish tradition. I hope, in my years on the bench of the Supreme Court of the United States, I will have the strength and the courage to remain constant in the service of that demand.”

Throughout her life and career, Justice Ginsburg fought against oppression and inequality. She is credited with transforming opportunities and livelihoods previously dictated by gender inequalities. She was influential on Civil Rights Law, and dismantled a network of laws which supported sex discrimination. Perhaps surprisingly, many of her landmark legal successes came while she was representing men. Ultimately, Justice Ginsberg was clear: gender inequality is harmful to everyone. 

She also said “Promoting active liberty does not mean allowing the majority to run roughshod over minorities. It calls for taking special care that all groups have a chance to fully participate in society and the political process.”

We can’t be RBG, but she was carrying on a legacy of justice that is our inheritance and obligation too. We may not be able to change or to create legislation, but in our own ways and our own worlds we can have the strength and courage to serve that command.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, asked to give advice to young people about how to fulfil that obligation said “Let them be sure that every deed counts, that every word has power, and that we can do our share to redeem the world despite all absurdities and all the frustration and all the disappointment.”

We can each do our share. Indeed, it is all that we can do. The only question is how we plan to do it.

Rosh Chodesh Elul

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1st Elul  2021 Rosh Hashanah Le’ma’aseir Behema    9th August

Mishnah tells us there are four New Years, and the 1st of Elul is the New Year for the accounting purposes of tithing domestic animals.

While this is a date for a Temple practise and therefore has no practical significance today, the date has been glossed in order to publicise the Jewish value of Tza‘ar Ba’alei Hayim  – of preventing the suffering of animals.

The phrase originates in a Talmudic discussion about the treatment of domestic beasts, their loading and the conditions they must work under (BT Bava Metzia 32b).

Hebrew uses a number of words for animals – in Genesis animals, like humans are “Nefesh Chaya” – living souls. Biblically we see behema/ot are domesticated animals, Chaya (literally “alive” the word for wild animals (in modern Hebrew the generic word for animals, while wild animals are chayat bar, animals of the wild). But this  Talmudic  phrase Ba’alei Hayim not only recognises that animals are living, but that they are quite literally the masters or owners of life.

What does it mean to be an owner of life? And how does seeing our domestic animals as such figures influence how we think of them and treat them?

Judaism generally treats God as the Owner of Life – the One who gives and takes away life. We read in Talmud (Berachot 60b) the prayer familiar to all who read the morning service, the Elohai Neshama…:

When one awakens, one recites:
My God, the soul You have placed within me is pure.
You formed it within me,
You breathed it into me,
and You guard it while it is within me.
One day You will take it from me and restore it within me in the time to come.
As long as the soul is within me, I thank You,
O Eternal my God and God of my ancestors, Master of all worlds, Possessor of all souls.
Blessed are You, O Eternal who restores souls to lifeless bodies.

While it is clear that the Talmudic phrase “Ba’alei Chayim” is referencing animals that are in the service of human activity, it uses a lens we frequently ignore or even deny. Animals, even those who work for us or are farmed and herded in order to provide food for us, have a level of existence and meaning that also reflects the Creator of Life. We humans may have accorded ourselves the highest level in the creation story, the ones who name the animals and who will use them for our own benefit, but animal life too is important and has a spark of divine force, and it is not enough simply to avoid unnecessary cruelty.

Talmud tells us (BTBava Metzia 85a) “Once a calf being led to slaughter thrust its head into the skirts of Rabbi [Yehudah HaNasi]’s robe and began to bleat plaintively. “Go,” he said, “for this is why you were created.” Because he spoke without compassion, he was afflicted [at the hand of Heaven].(the midrash tells us he suffered toothache for 13 years)

Then one day, his maidservant was cleaning his house and came upon some young weasels. She was about to chase them away with a broom, when Rabbi Yehudah said to her, “Let them be, for it is written: ‘God’s tender mercies are upon all God’s works'” (Psalms 145:9). They said [in Heaven], “Since he is merciful, let him be treated with mercy.” [Thereafter, his pain ceased.]

This day, Rosh Chodesh Elul, is the day to consider the value of Tza’ar Ba’alei Hayim and ask ourselves, how do we value Creation in our daily lives.

Naso. Birkat Cohanim – we are commanded to bless God’s creation with love

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Rabbi Elazar ben Shammua was once asked by his disciples: To what do you attribute your longevity? He said to them: In all my days, I never made a shortcut [kappendarya] through a synagogue. Nor did I ever stride over the heads of the sacred people, i.e., I never stepped over people sitting in the study hall in order to reach my place, so as not to appear scornful of them. And I never lifted my hands for the Priestly Benediction without first reciting a blessing. The Gemara asks: What blessing does the priests recite before the benediction? Rabbi Zeira says that Rav Ḥisda says: Blessed are You, Eternal our God, Sovereign of the universe, Who has sanctified us with the sanctity of Aaron and commanded us to bless Your people, Israel, with love.  (BT Sota 39a)

This blessing is unique in its formulation. The Cohanim (priesthood) are commanded to perform the blessing with intentional and conscious love. While there are three commandments to love in Torah To “love your neighbour as yourself”(Leviticus 19:18); To “love the stranger as yourself” (Leviticus 19:34); and “You shall love the Eternal your God for all your heart, soul and strength” (Deuteronomy 6:4), there is no other blessing over a commandment that requires us to perform it “with love”

Rav Joseph B Soloveitchik  taught that this blessing, recited by the Kohanim prior to their delivering God’s Birkat Kohanim to God’s People, has much to teach us with its unique commandment to bless God’s people Israel with love. Rav Soloveitchik explains that this is not a blessing on the mitzvah per se “but it is a desire for the Priestly Blessing to be accompanied by love.”

He notes that the commandment of Birkat Cohanim has two separate parts – there is “the  transmission of a direct blessing from God” as the priests speak the words and God blesses the people and there is also  hashra’at ha-Shechinah (the manifestation of God’s presence).”

In effect, when the  Birkat Kohanim is recited, there “is a direct meeting with the Shechinah that presents us with an intimate encounter in which we come [so to speak] face to face with God.” (Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, Darosh Darash Yosef: Discourses of Rav Yosef Dov Halevi Soloveitchik on the Weekly Parashah)

Unlike any other prayer or any other benediction, this ancient text of threefold blessing, given in community yet addressed in the singular to each and every person,  has the power to eradicate the distance between the people and God. And so, says Rav Soloveitchik, we are reminded to enact it with intentional and deliberate love.

When Moses is told to tell Aaron about the giving of this blessing, the text is clear. The priests will say the words, but the blessing is to come directly from God. This is why the Cohanim uttering the words do not have to be deeply righteous or saintly people necessarily – they are only the vessels through which the blessings come.  On ascending the bimah to give the blessing they become faceless, their heads covered by their tallit they neither look directly at the people nor do the people look directly at them. Their role overrides any personal history at this moment.

And yet – this is more than those of Aaronic descent being the conduit for a divine blessing. As Rav Soloveitchik understands the event, they are not only conveying the divine blessing but they are re-enacting hashra’at ha-Shechinah – literally creating an immediate and intimate encounter between God and the Jewish people.

By doing this with intentional love, it seems to me that the Cohanim are taking on something of the role or characteristic of the Divine.  Unconditional love, deliberate and intentional love, is a pre-requisite of the ceremony. Regardless of who is saying the words of blessing, regardless of the actions and choices of each of the individuals receiving those words of blessing, the bond is formed through loving acceptance of the other.

The word for love used in the blessing “ahavah” is first used in the narrative the Akedah, when God speaks to Abraham of his son Isaac “the one you love” before testing that love to the limit. Ahavah seems to be used biblically across a full spectrum of loving feelings – from parental love to sensual love to loving friendship to spiritual love.  All use the verbal root alef hey beit.

The mystical tradition notes that the numerical value of ahavah (love) and echad (one) are the same – 13, and that the verse that precedes the command us to love God ends with the word “Echad” – describing the unity of God – a verse best known as the first line of the shema.

From this comes the idea that perceiving unity is the ultimate objective of love, and that love both brings the understanding that not only God is One, but creation too is connected and makes up one whole – even while we tend to note diversity and difference more frequently than we note unity and similarity.

So why are we commanded to love God? Because loving God – who is unified and whole – should cause us to love Creation – which is unified and whole. Loving God means we have to love people – all people, regardless of whether we might find them appealing or appalling, regardless of whether they are “of us” or are different from us.

The Talmud (Yoma 9b)  tells us that the destruction of Jerusalem and the Exile of the Jewish people from the Land of Israel was a direct result of sinat chinam –  causeless hatred.  Rav Abraham Isaac Kook famously wrote that to rebuild Israel we would have to cultivate ahavat chinam – causeless love.

Causeless love is the requirement in the blessing before Birkat Cohanim, the priestly blessing. It is the only time we say the blessing to fulfil a mitzvah with these words. We need to nurture and cultivate the ability to causeless love for the other, not because this makes us fit to be the conduit for God’s blessing in the world, but because this makes us able to bring God’s presence into the world.

As Rabbi Akiva said, “Love your neighbour as yourself is the foundational principle (klal gadol) of Torah”.   He was not talking about love as feelings, nor as something to be earned or deserved, but to treat other human being with respect, with justice, with awareness that they too are part of the Unity that God has created, that they are part of us as we are part of them.

In this time of increasing polarisation, of rising anxiety and tensions, of spewing hatred in social media and on our streets, it is time to remember the unique formulation of blessing before enacting hashra’at ha-Shechinah, trying to bring God into the world; time to remember and be intentional knowing that God commands us to treat God’s people with love.

23rd March – A National Day of Reflection on the anniversary of the UK lockdown, and we remember all those who lost their lives to Covid 19

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“A full year of lockdown has passed and more than one hundred and twenty six thousand people in the UK are recorded as having lost their lives to Covid 19. We grieve every person; we mourn for all the joy and wisdom, warmth and love that has left our world with their deaths.

A little more than a year ago our world was upended with news of the coronavirus, our relationships and our lives destabilised as fear crept into our waking moments and anxiety coloured our dreams. We are grieving for the world we knew; for the easy handshakes and hugs; for the freedom to go wherever we needed to, unafraid and straightforwardly.

We have learned in this past year about our own mortality, about how lightly life is worn and how easily it can fall from us. Some of us have experienced great illness and recovered, some of us are continuing to suffer; some of us have watched a loved one suffer without being able to be close to them, or are living with the knowledge that they died alone, comforted not by their family or friends, but by caring strangers.

As we remember those whose lives were cruelly cut short by this virus, our feelings flow and change, overcome and recede. We are cut off from the comforts of being with each other,  from the squeezing of hands and the sharing of glances, from the rituals of saying a proper goodbye. 

But while each of us may mourn alone, we also share our grief. The lonely path we are walking is being trodden by so many others.  Walking alongside us, even if we do not see and cannot touch them, we are remembering and grieving together. People across the world – and close to home – are sharing the journey. Reach out, help and loving support is closer than you think.

photo by Daria Shatova on Unsplash

The Trees who sought a Sovereign

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L’italiano segue l’inglese

In the Book of Judges we find a fantastical story of a debate between the trees about who should become their king. They first asked the olive tree who refused on account of the oil it produces; then they asked the fig who refused because she produced sweet fruit, and finally the grapevine who refused – well you get the idea. Then they asked the thornbush who responded that if they would honour him they could shelter under his shade, but if not, fire would come that would destroy even the cedars of Lebanon.

The story is told by Jotham, the youngest son of Gideon the judge who had brought Israel back to God after it had strayed into idolatry, but who notably had refused the kingship, saying that neither he nor any son would rule over them, only God was ruler of Israel.

Yet Abimelech, one of Gideon’s sons had other ideas. After Gideon’s death Abimelech committed fratricide to become the first king of Israel. Bible tells us Gideon had seventy sons – only Jotham survived Abimelech’s murderous onslaught by hiding. When Abimelech was made king in Shechem, Jotham stood atop Mt Gerizim and declared the story of the trees to the populace.

What was the purpose? To remind the people that good leadership comes with personal sacrifice, and that those who grab leadership for their own benefit can bring down the whole of society. Three trees were not prepared to give up their fruitful lives to take on leadership, and so the barren yet aggressive thorn was able to assume the title, with the false claim that it could provide protective shade (it cannot). Once in power, if anyone went against it, it could fuel the fires that would destroy them all. 

Civil war scarred the population. Abimelech died after a brief and bloody reign. Jotham’s story is for us all.

Gli alberi che cercavano un sovrano
di rav Sylvia Rothschild
pubblicato il 20 gennaio 2021
Nel Libro dei Giudici troviamo una storia fantastica di un dibattito tra gli alberi su chi sarebbe
dovuto diventare il loro re. Dapprima chiesero all’olivo, che rifiutò a causa dell’olio che produce;
poi chiesero al fico, che rifiutò perché produceva frutta dolce, infine alla vite che rifiutò… beh,
avrete capito. Chiesero quindi al roveto, che rispose che se lo avessero onorato avrebbero potuto
ripararsi sotto la sua ombra, ma in caso contrario sarebbe arrivato un fuoco che avrebbe distrutto
anche i cedri del Libano.
La storia è raccontata da Jotham, il figlio più giovane di Gedeone, il giudice che aveva riportato a
Dio il popolo di Israele dopo che si era smarrito nell’idolatria, ma che in particolare aveva rifiutato
la regalità, dicendo che né lui né alcun figlio avrebbe governato sul popolo, solo Dio era
governatore di Israele.
Eppure Abimelech, uno dei figli di Gedeone, aveva altre idee. Dopo la morte di Gedeone
Abimelech commise fratricidio per diventare il primo re di Israele. La Bibbia ci dice che Gedeone
aveva settanta figli e solo Jotham sopravvisse all’assalto omicida di Abimelech nascondendosi.
Quando Abimelech fu nominato re a Sichem, Jotham si trovava in cima al monte Gherizim e
raccontò alla popolazione la storia degli alberi.
Qual era lo scopo? Ricordare alle persone che una buona leadership viene fornita con il sacrificio
personale e che coloro che afferrano il potere a proprio vantaggio possono abbattere l’intera
società. Tre alberi non erano pronti a rinunciare alle loro vite fruttuose per assumere il comando,
e così la spina sterile ma aggressiva fu in grado di assumere il titolo, con la falsa affermazione che
poteva fornire ombra protettiva (non può). Una volta al potere, se qualcuno si fosse messo contro,
avrebbe potuto alimentare gli incendi che li avrebbero distrutti tutti.
La guerra civile segnò la popolazione. Abimelech morì dopo un breve e sanguinoso regno. La storia
di Jotham è per tutti noi.
Traduzione dall’inglese di Eva Mangialajo Rantzer

The lights of Chanukah – in times of Covid it is important to bring forth the hidden light

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l’italiano segue l’inglese

The festival of Chanukah commemorates the regaining of the Jerusalem Temple in 164 BCE, and its rededication, after the occupying Seleucids had defiled it by imposing Hellenic culture and worship over its empire, and prohibiting any other religious worship. 

The story of the successful revolt by a small group of pious Jews against the large military power of its day has a touch of the miraculous, and sure enough, the narratives which are first told in the apocryphal first two Books of Maccabees have evolved in their retelling, embroidered and shaped well beyond the original rather violent events.

The darkest parts of this story of revolutionary struggle, and Jew fighting Jew in bloody civil war – as some embraced the new culture while others resisted fiercely – are glossed and reframed  in the Talmud, which determinedly saw Chanukah as less of a human story of oppression and guerrilla warfare, and more as a demonstration of the divine presence in history. So today we celebrate the miracle of oil staying alight for 8 days rather than one, and we eat foods cooked in oil and play games of chance that refer to the miracle; we give presents each night and generally have fun with friends and family, and we think very little of the origin of the festival being fierce rebellion against assimilation with the dominant power.

The date of Chanukah – 25th Kislev – moves around the calendar a little but is always around Christmas. And the date is not the only similarity. Both are festivals rooted in pagan winter solstice where lighting the surrounding darkness is central. Both use tree symbolism – the Chanukiah is based on the Temple Menorah, which bible describes using botanical terms – clearly a Tree of Life, while Christmas uses evergreens – holly, ivy, fir trees – to proclaim Everlasting Life. Both stories are set in times of oppression – the Seleucid Empire and the Roman one, and both embed hope that human oppression is vanquished by divine activity. Both signal God’s presence in the world and both stories have a mythic quality of redemption.

The mitzvah of lighting the Chanukah candles is to proclaim the miracle – known by its Talmudic name of “pirsumei nissa” (the word paras means to spread or to reveal- in modern Hebrew it is the root of the word pirsommet – advertisement. Nissa is better known to us as “nes” – miracle). So we are supposed to light the Chanukiah in the boundary between our private space and the public space – in a window or by a doorway, in order to “advertise” the story of Chanukah – in particular the miracle, which is above all a story of hope as well as of holiness.

What was the miracle of Chanukah? The story of holding onto an identity when the political climate was determinedly eroding it must surely be part of the extraordinary story, even if that meant a dark time of division in the internal Jewish world.

The story of a small group fighting a much larger power for the right to self-determination must surely also be part of the “miracle” – for we see today so many groups and peoples still fighting for that right, and we see how much energy is expended for often so little reward, something which can destroy even the most committed activist’s well-being.

But I think the biggest miracle of Chanukah is the hope that is expressed when the last oil was set aflame, and no one knew for sure what would happen when it would go out.

This year has been a time of extraordinary darkness for so many of us. While Covid has ravaged the populations of the world, we have also been engaged in division and fuelled by impotent anger. How did this disease come into the world? Who can we blame? What about our fellow citizens not taking the right precautions? Or our Governments imposing lockdowns and apparently removing our freedoms?

We have seen both extraordinary compassion and terrible frustration. Frontline workers giving their all to society, while other people have been much less selfless.

We are tired and frightened and unsure about the future, we have survived the Spring and the Summer but now we face winter and the light is lessening with each passing day.

How much this year do we need the lights of Chanukah? The lights that every day increase and bring us growing hope that we are explicitly told to share with others.

In the story of Creation, everything begins with the creation of Light.   First there was “tohu vavohu” – unformed chaos, and there was darkness. And God said “Let there be light, and there was light, and God saw that the light was good and divided the light from the darkness, calling Light Day, and Darkness night.  That was day one. But the sun and the moon are only created on day four – so what is this primordial light? 

Our mystical tradition suggests that this earliest light is the hidden light, the light that is present even in darkness. We allow it to emerge when we are engaged in God’s will – when we study, do good deeds, make the world a better place.

The story of Chanukah reminds us that there is always light, even when we don’t always see it. It may be hidden in the darkness but it is there. And it is for us to bring it forth into the world, to share it with others, to promote hope and well-being in our world, so that the blessing of God’s face shines on us all.

La festa di  Chanukah ricorda la riconquista del tempio di Gerusalemme nel 164 BCE, e la sua ri-conscrazione, in seguito alla sua occupazione da parte dei Seleucidi, i quali lo avevavo dissacrato imponendo una cultura ellenica e la sua venerazione in ogni angolo del proprio impero, vietando altri culti.

La storia di una rivolta di successo da parte di un piccolo gruppo di pii ebrei contro una delle più grandi potenze militari di allora ha un che di miracoloso, e non a caso, i racconti presenti nei due apocrifi libri dei Maccabei si sono evoluti, trasformati e sono finiti per andare ben oltre quei violenti eventi originariamente descritti.

I dettagli più bui di questa storia fatta di lotta rivoluzionario, in cui gli ebrei combattevano l’uno contro l’altro in una guerra civile sangunaria (alcuni abbracciarono la nuova cultura mentre altri si opposero violentemente) vengono ignorati e riproposti nel Talmud, dove Chanukah viene vista meno come una storia umana di oppressione e guerriglia, e più come una dimostrazione di una storica presenza divina. Di conseguenza, oggi celebriamo il miracolo dell’olio che rimase accesso per otto giorni consecutivi, e mangiamo cibi fritti e giochiamo a giochi basati sul caso che si riferiscono al suddetto miracolo; ogni notte ci scambiamo regali e ci divertiamo in compagnia di amici e parenti, e non pensiamo troppo all’origine di questa festa fatta di feroce ribellione nei confronti di una potenza dominante con un obbiettivo di assimilazione.

La data  di Chanukah – il 25 di  Kislev – tende a spostarsi nel nostro calendario ma avviene sempre intorno al natale. E la data non è l’unica cosa che queste due feste hanno in comune. Entrambe sono feste legate al solstizio d’inverno pagano, dove il dare luce all’oscurità circostante è il punto centrale. Entrambe le feste utilizzano il simbolismo degli alberi- la Chanukiah è basata sulla menorah dell’antico tempio, che nella bibbia viene descritta utilizzando termini botanici-chiaramente un albero della vita, mentre il natale utilizza sempreverdi- agrifogli, edera, pini– per proclamare la vita eterna.Entrambe le storie hanno luogo in tempi di oppressione-l’impero Seleucida e quello Romano, ed entrambe rapparesentano la speranza che l’oppressione umana possa essere sconfitta da un’intervento divino. Entrambe segnalano la presenza di Dio nel mondo ed entrambe le storie hanno una qualità mistica di redenzione.

La mitzvah dell’accendere le candele di Chanukah è proclamare il miracolo– conosciuto nel Talmud come “pirsumei nissa” (la parola “paras” significa rivelare e nel ebraico moderno è la radice della parola pirsommet – annunciazione. Conosciamo meglio il termine Nissa come “nes” – miracolo). Di conseguenza, dobbiamo accendere la Chanukiah in quello spazio tra il nostro spazio privato e quello pubblico-davanti ad una finestra o vicino ad una porta, in modo da “annunciare” la storia di Chanukah – in particolare il miracolo, che è in tutto e per tutto una storia di speranza ed una di sacralità.

Quale fu il miracolo di Chanukah? La storia del rimanere aggrappati alla propria identità in un clima politica che stava tentando di eroderla ne fa sicuramente parte, anche se ciò significava un periodo buio di divisione nel mondo ebraico.

La storia di un piccolo gruppo che ha combattuto contro un potere ben più grande per il diritto dell’autodeterminazione sicuramente fa parte del “miracolo”- e anche oggi vediamo gruppi e popoli che stanno ancora combattendo per quel diritto, e vediamo quanta energia viene spesa rispetto al premio ottenuto, un qualcosa che può distruggere la psiche anche dell’attivista più dedito.

Ma credo che il miracolo di Chanukah sia la speranza espressa quando venne utilizzata l’ultima goccia d’olio e nessuno sapeva per certo cosa sarebbe successo una volta che si fosse estinta la fiamma da essa generata.

Quest’ anno è stato caratterizzato da straordinaria oscurità per molti di noi. Mentre il Covid ha devastato le popolazioni del mondo, ci siamo anche trovati divisi e pieni di rabbia impotente. Come è nata questa malattia? A chi possiamo dare la colpa? Cosa dire dei nostri concittadini che non prendono le dovute precauzioni? Cosa dire dei nostri governi che impongono lockdown, apparentemente limitando le nostre libertà?

Abbiamo assistito sia a straordinaria compassione che terribile frustrazione. Gli operatori in prima linea che hanno dato tutto per la società, mentre altri sono stati meno altruisti.

Siamo stanchi , impauriti ed incerti sul futuro, siamo sopravvisuti alla primavera ed all’estate, ma ora ci troviamo ad affrontare l’inverno e le ore di luce continuano a diminuire giorno per giorno.

Di quanto abbiamo bisogno delle luci di Chanukah quest’anno? Le luci che ogni giorno aumentano e che ci donano speranza e che ci viene detto esplicitamente dobbiamo condividere con gli altri.

Nella storia della genesi, tutto inizia con la creazione della luce. In principio vi fu “tohu vavohu” – caos senza forma, e  vi era oscurità. E Dio disse “Sia la luce, e la luce fu, e Dio vide che la luce era cosa buona e separò la luce dalle tenebre, e fu sera e fu mattina.” Questo fu il primo giorno. Ma il sole e la luna vennero solo creati il quarto giorno-quindi che cos’è questa luce primordiale?

La nostra tradizione mistica ci propone che questa prima luce è una luce nascosta, la luce che è sempre presente anche nelle tenebre. Facciamo si che emerga quando seguiamo il volere di Dio-quando studiamo, compiamo buone azioni e rendiamo il mondo un posto migliore.  

La storia di Chanukah ci ricorda che vi è sempre luce, anche quando non riusciamo a vederla. Sarà anche nascosta nelle tenebre, ma è pur sempre li. Sta a noi portarla nel mondo, condividerla con altri e promuovere speranza e benessere nel nostro mondo, in modo che la benedizione del volto di Dio possa illuminarci tutti.

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