Although Chanukah has been around for a long time, one shouldn’t think that it has always had the significance it has today. Ostensibly a minor observance (think Rosh Chodesh or one of the minor fasts), the last hundred and twenty years have brought it out of the woodwork and to the forefront of Jewish consciousness.
On the surface, there are three major causes for this:
- Most familiar to many of us in the West is the commercialization of Christmas among our Christian neighbors, which has put pressure on many sectors of the Jewish community to compete. The only holiday available at somewhat the same time, of course, is Chanukah.
- Yet, even before this, the early Zionist movement focused on nationalist themes that could only be found in the story of Chanukah. Subsequently, Zionism invested the holiday with much greater visibility on the Jewish communal calendar.
- Picking up on these developments, Lubavitch has made Chanukah one of the focal points of their efforts to reinforce Jewish identity and faith. The highly prominent and ubiquitous Chabad menorahs have added a new dimension to the mitzvah of publicizing the miracle, making it difficult for any but the most assimilated to ignore the existence of the holiday.
We could see the rise of Chanukah in our times as coincidental, due to developments that have little to do with each other. Still, it seems rather curious that Chanukah’s place on the calendar, its major theme, and twentieth century Jewish history have so much in common.
Chanukah always falls on or near the Northern Hemisphere’s winter solstice (the shortest day in the year, or more to the point, the longest night). Once we pass the solstice, the days slowly and then rapidly get longer.
And if Chanukah’s place on the solar calendar seems revealing, its place on the Jewish calendar is even more fascinating: There are two spiritual beginnings in the Jewish calendar – the first day in Tishrei and the first day in Nissan (see Tractate Rosh HaShanah 10b-11a, wherein the fundamental importance of these two dates creates a disagreement among our sages as to which one marked the creation of the world). The midpoint between these highlights is the last day in Kislev, which I believe is not coincidentally the midpoint of Chanukah.*
While Chanukah’s position on the solar calendar makes it the shortest physical days, the lunar calendar places it on the shortest spiritual days – in the Biblical calendar, the longest gap between holidays is that between Tishrei and Nissan. Just as we receive the least physical sunlight on the solstice, Chanukah’s distance from the seasons of our spiritual light also makes this time of year the most spiritually dark. And as with the solstice marking a turning point, the 29th of Kislev marks the beginning of the slow return to the greater spiritual light of Nissan.
If Chanukah appears in a dark place on our calendar, it also appears in a dark place in our history. The Hellenization of Judea that led to the Maccabean revolt was a process largely led by the Jews themselves. While Jews had succumbed to the attraction of false foreign beliefs many times previously, Chanukah marks the first time that Jews were prepared to betray their nation completely. The Hellenization of Jerusalem was brought about by Jews who felt that Jewish nationality was somehow inferior to the larger, newer culture of the Greeks. Instead of proclaiming the unique message of Jewish culture, Jerusalem became a cheap imitation of Athens and Alexandria. Thus, it was not just Jewish practice that was in question, it was also Jewish peoplehood.