Childhood flashbacks

[elfs]

lisakit bravely braved the hellhole known as Southcenter Shopping Mall the other day to help me with some last-minute Christmas shopping and as we were making our way we stopped at a Hallmark store. While she was getting cards for her family, I passed by the little blue ghetto of Hanukkah stuff, always tucked away on the left edge of the store where no one ever goes unless deliberately.

I was unimpressed with most of the display. Hanukkah isn't really that big a deal for Jews; it's a celebration of an Israeli fundamentalist sect, the Maccabees, and their military victory over the Greek occupation of Jerusalem, along with the "Hanukkah miracle" that allowed the Maccabees to light and keep alit the eternal flame at the Jerusalem synagogue for eight days until a resupply of the holy oil could be brought into the city. Kinda cool, but nowhere near the importance of Yom Kippur. It's become a big deal in the US because of its relative proximity to Christmas, of course.

On the top shelf of the display were the candles. Jews light one candle per day to celebrate the miracle. The holiday survived the Roman occupation only in oral form-- it's not recorded in the legalistic writings of the rabbis-- and mostly through the candle lighting ceremony, as a reminder that someday the occupiers would be driven out of the city and the city restored to the Israelis. And while I could remember nothing at all about what my family did during Hanukkah, I could still recite the prayer on the back of the candle box from memory.

Comments

[lisakit.livejournal.com]

So what's the prayer?

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

It was a big deal around the Green Monster last year, and I hear tell from geoljc it was as big a deal this year... latkes and crown challah (round with raisins) and presents for short people... and I also hear tell that it was a darn good thing it was Hanukkah this year, when the lights went out after the candles were all lit...

.... and I had absolutely no idea you had that in your heritage.

Shalom.

[shunra.livejournal.com]

Bless you, Elf, for knowing that. The Christmas connection has made people I talk to about Hannukah think I'm either crazy or lying, but I grew up with Hannukah being understood the way you described it: not too important for Jewish tradition, although it (like most other days, holy or otherwise) has its own rules to follow. (One of the biggies: the candles must not be used for light; 'ela lirotam bilvad' - they are to be seen and not utilized in any way.)

And then, of course, there was the Zionist take on Hannukah: the success of a rebellion against a larger power, and the creation of an Israelite state (it was not Jewish yet; Judaism basically started once they ran out of temples and needed to sublimate the animal sacrifices into other practices). Zionist schools (in contrast with ultr-orthodox and orthodox ones) tended to teach that the Maccabbees' state objected to Hellenization (glossing over the significance of that objection: adherence to Israelite tradition and objection to philosophy, commerce, and sport; participation in sport was a big sore spot for the Israelites.)

The Zionist view was the one I grew up in. It glorified the Maccabbees and their success and borrowed elements from other cultures such as jelly doughnuts (Berliners; the kind JFK was falsely accused of claiming to be) and torchlit processions (favorite of fundamentalist warriors everywhere).

Greeting cards (Hanukkah cards) never caught on, because the card-sending holiday is Rosh Hashannah. This has led to many amusing translation requests: "How do you say Merry Christmas in Hebrew?" "Well, that depends on whom you want to offend."

Anyhow, thanks for knowing and saying that. It feels less like I've slid into an alternative world where up means sideways and down means purple.