CHANUKAH 5781 SECTION E, PAGE 23
A COVID Chanukah. We find ourselves this year in a place that feels darker than usual.
Due to the news of the high efficacy of a vaccine, the hope of finally taming COVID briefly soared, only to plummet again as the grim news and reality of the current spike — and the thought of safely getting through a COVID winter until a vaccine is widely available — is concerning.
Most years, night after night, it’s a swirl of Chanukah soirees. The family Chanukah party, the friend’s one, a holiday work event, the neighbors, shul — and the list goes on.
But the essence of Chanukah is really in the mitzvah of the lighting.
A window framed, a silhouetted menorah, kindled. Illuminating the dark of a starry night. This is the essence of Chanukah. An intimate moment by the glow of a flame, at your window.
In fact, tradition guides us to meditate upon the glow of the kindled menorah. Its light is not to be used for any utilitarian purpose, only for the sake of the kindled light itself.
This year, with nowhere to rush to after Chanukah lighting, it’s almost an imposed intimacy and opportunity to meditate upon the sacred flames of the menorah.
The truth is, I could stare at them for hours, and there have been Chanukah nights that I have (at times in a little game I used to play with my youngest brother). There is something about gazing upon what can feel like living, breathing, flickering flames of lit wicks floating upon the glass-encased olive oil. Their constant movement can be mesmerizing. It’s like watching something in process, the experience of watching light lighting up your room, lighting up your life, literally and figuratively dispelling the darkness.
Every light kindled in the dark brings with it some shadows. To be sure, this year, as we gaze upon the special Chanukah light, there is also the shadow of COVID. There is a quiet healing we can feel as we look into the light, and as we do so it can summon moments from earlier times. The kindled menorah is quite conducive to contemplation.
This year, for eight nights, it is the grace of these past Chanukahs that can imbue our holiday with the caress of loving recollections, taking us beyond the present, not only to the past but to a hoped for COVID-less future, when we can once again gather on Chanukah with loved ones. Chanukah contemplation is timeless.
I remember living in Jerusalem through the Second Intifada in Jerusalem. It was terrifying. My grandparents lived a life of burden, their families amputated, having gone up in smoke at Auschwitz. We were always raised on the stories of our grandparents who struggled though so much — and overcame.
In many ways, though, we were blessed, overall, with lives of ease. Running water. Electricity. Freedom. Opportunity. COVID right now brings a stagnancy to our lives, an uncertainty about what’s to come. It can generate a sense of hopelessness. Chanukah, comes along, though, and it’s as if it says: There is a counterpoint to hopelessness. It’s in the lighting of the candles. It’s in becoming the candle! Bringing the light and illumination to the dark places, dark spaces, dark corners of our physical, emotional, spiritual or psychological worlds.
Perhaps the usual enchantments of the holiday are temporarily unavailable right now, but if we are blessed to see dark places illuminated, if we can still kindle the menorah and, candle after candle, night after night, bring more light to the world, why, then, perhaps on some level this year’s Chanukah is not all that different from any other.
Wishing a glowing Chanukah 2020 to you and yours Dear Readers!
Copyright © 2020 by the Intermountain Jewish News
