Hanukka candles and the Information Age

"Hanukka could teach us how to deal with a multicultural world."

By RABBI SHMUEL RABINOWITZ
Updated: DECEMBER 29, 2016 10:58
Hanukkiot projected on the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City during Hanukka last year (photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
Hanukkiot projected on the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City during Hanukka last year
(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
Hanukka, which the Jewish people has been celebrating for almost 2,200 years, is a holiday marking a historic event that occurred during the Second Temple period.
Antiochus IV Epiphanes was the Greek king of the Seleucid Empire. He wanted to impose Hellenistic culture in the Land of Israel and did so by enforcing destructive decrees forbidding Jews to fulfill God’s commandments. The Hasmonean family, priests who inhabited the area of Modi’in not far from Jerusalem, led a revolt that ultimately – and surprisingly – succeeded in overcoming the Seleucid Empire and establishing Jewish rule in the Land of Israel.
One of the high points of the revolt was when the Hasmoneans and their supporters succeeded in removing foreign rule from the Temple in Jerusalem, purifying the Temple by removing the idolatrous symbols the Greeks had put in it, and lighting the Menorah in the Temple. In memory of this miracle, we celebrate the festival of Hanukka and light candles for eight days to publicize the miracle of lighting the Menorah in the Temple.
One of Antiochus’s decrees was described by sages of the midrash as follows: The Greeks, who darkened the eyes of Israel with their decrees, would tell them: “Write on the horn of an ox that you have no part in the God of Israel” (Midrash Genesis Raba 2:4).
The message the Greeks wanted to impose on the Jews was clear. They wanted to annihilate the Jewish faith and lifestyle. But the way in which they sought to do this – by writing on the “horn of an ox” – needs to be explained.
What is “the horn of an ox” and for what is it used? At that time, the horn of an ox served as a bottle for feeding babies. The Greeks wanted to inculcate, already from the baby’s birth: “We have no part in the God of Israel.” The Greeks, as well as those who opposed the Hasmoneans, understood all too well that this was a culture war, and therefore the war focused on Jewish education, beginning with young children.
Culture wars are not necessarily fought violently.
Hanukka could teach us how to deal with a multicultural world, one in which every person and every child is exposed to cultural messages that are occasionally very different from Jewish cultural values.
We must pay attention to this especially nowadays.
We live in the Information Age, when exposure to different cultures is almost inevitable. A person could bequeath Jewish values to his children, but immediately afterward they are exposed to cultures with values opposed to Jewish ones.
Every parent wants to pass on his heritage to his children, a heritage with what he or she considers to be positive values. We must find successful ways of doing this in an era when our children, and even we, are exposed to so much varied information.
It seems that succeeding in this depends on our ability to make Judaism beloved to us and to our sons and daughters. Victory in this confrontation cannot be achieved other than by reaching a person’s heart.
Judaism is not weak. It has great power and can withstand this confrontation. But to do so requires profundity, insight, and above all a joyous Judaism, a Judaism that a person feels completes him and contributes positively to his life.
Along with this, Hanukka is about family, celebrating in a cozy home.
Family members who gather around the candles, playing games and uniting while feeling connected to the Jewish people and its glorious history, face up to their significant roles as Jews in the Information Age.
The writer is the rabbi of the Western Wall and holy sites.