Author Archives: Rabbi Thiede

Hanukkah-O-Gram – Eighth Day: Did You Know?

Posted by Rabbi Thiede on December 23, 2014   |   Comments Off on Hanukkah-O-Gram – Eighth Day: Did You Know?

Day 8 HanukkahThere was oil for one day. Why do we observe eight days of Hanukah when the burning was, for one day, no miracle at all?

  1. The first day of the festival commemorates the military victory of the 25th of Kislev when the Jews rested from battle.
  2. The discovery of the jar was, in itself, a miracle.
  3. The discovered oil was divided into eight portions to last the eight days for the production of new oil. Miraculously, the minute portions burned all day long.
  4. After the menorah was filled with all the available oil, the jar remained full (or variations on that theme).
  5. The jar actually absorbed some of the oil so there wasn’t really enough for one full day.
  6. The fact that the Jews did not despair and had enough faith to fulfill the commandment to light the light at all was itself a great miracle.

Hanukkah-O-Gram – Seventh Day: Did You Know?

Posted by Rabbi Thiede on December 22, 2014   |   Comments Off on Hanukkah-O-Gram – Seventh Day: Did You Know?

Day 7 HanukkahRabbis Shammai and Hillel, Shammai famously argued about many points of practice, including the lighting of the hanukkiah.  Shammai maintained that we should start with all eight candles and light one candle less each evening to mark the days of Hanukkah left to come. Hillel insisted that we should light an additional candle to symbolize the days already fulfilled as well as increase our experience of holiness and not diminish it.  Looks like Hillel won that one…

Chag Sameach,

Rabbi Barbara

Hanukkah-O-Gram – Sixth Day: Did You Know?

Posted by Rabbi Thiede on December 21, 2014   |   Comments Off on Hanukkah-O-Gram – Sixth Day: Did You Know?

Day 6 HanukkahSome scholars suggest that the reason for an eight-day holiday was less to do with the story of a miracle than the fact that Hanukkah was modeled on Sukkot, which also featured King Solomon’s dedication of the First Temple, recorded in 1 Kings: 8.  The Maccabees could not observe Sukkot while they were fugitives in the mountains of Judea so they made Hanukkah a kind of recompense for the festival they missed.  And it, too, of course, included the (re)dedication of the Temple.

Chag sameach,

Rabbi Barbara

Hannukah-O-Gram – Fifth Day: Did You Know?

Posted by Rabbi Thiede on December 20, 2014   |   Comments Off on Hannukah-O-Gram – Fifth Day: Did You Know?

Day 5 HanukkahMaimonides, the 12th century philosopher and doctor who wrote The Guide for the Perplexed, (also known as the Rambam) claimed that since the Levis were not included in altar offerings, God promised Moses there would be another dedication: Hanukkah!

Chag sameach,

Rabbi Barbara

Hanukkah-O-Gram – Fourth Day: Did You Know?

Posted by Rabbi Thiede on December 19, 2014   |   Comments Off on Hanukkah-O-Gram – Fourth Day: Did You Know?

Day 4 HanukkahOn Shabbat: Light your Hanukkia, then your Shabbat candles. At the end of Shabbat, first make havdalah and then light the hanukkia.  (Though here the rule of two Jews and three opinions applies because some Jews do exactly the opposite and begin with lighting the hanukkia!) In any case, the Rambam (Maimonides), 12th century Jewish philosopher, advises: If you must choose between spending money on Kiddush wine and lights for hanukkia, the latter wins.

Shabbat Shalom and chag sameach!

Rabbi Barbara

Hanukkah-O-Gram – Third Day: Did You Know?

Posted by Rabbi Thiede on December 18, 2014   |   Comments Off on Hanukkah-O-Gram – Third Day: Did You Know?

Day 3 HanukkahThe rabbis advise making sure that your mezuzah is the right when you enter a home but that your hanukkiah is on the left side.  Why?  A door serves for entry and departure.  One’s hanukkiah is to the right on the way of departure.  May light be shed upon us  as we go “outside” to join the nations.

Chag sameach!

Rabbi Barbara

Hanukkah-O-Gram – Second Day: Did You Know?

Posted by Rabbi Thiede on December 17, 2014   |   Comments Off on Hanukkah-O-Gram – Second Day: Did You Know?

Day 2 HanukkahIt is customary among the Sephardi communities in Yerushalayim (Jerusalem) to arrange joint meals during Hanukkah. Friends who quarreled during the year are reconciled.

Chag Sameach!

Rabbi Barbara

Hanukkah-O-Gram – First Day: Did You Know?

Posted by Rabbi Thiede on December 16, 2014   |   Comments Off on Hanukkah-O-Gram – First Day: Did You Know?

Day 1 HanukkahDid you know? (Day 1!)

Hanukkah is celebrated on the 25th of Kislev. The twenty-fifth word of the Torah is ohr (light) and the twenty-fifth place of encampment in the wilderness journey was Hasmoneh. The Hasmonean family led the rebellion against the Syrian king, Antiochus, who prohibited Jewish practice.

Click here for instructions for lighting your Hanukkiah.

Chag sameach!

Rabbi Barbara

Shabbat-O-Gram – A New Hanukkah Tradition?

Posted by Rabbi Thiede on December 12, 2014   |   Comments Off on Shabbat-O-Gram – A New Hanukkah Tradition?

HanukkiahsHanukkah begins next Tuesday. We’ll light the first candle when it’s dark, anticipating the light that will grow each additional day. We’ll set the hanukkiah in the window, watch the tiny flames reflect across the ledge, out into the dark world, and back towards the cozy warmth of our homes.

We do have prayers we say when we kindle the lights of the hanukkiah, of course. But our modern celebration is mostly around eating food that is extremely tasty (though marginally healthy…), playing the dreidel game with the younger set, and giving presents.

It’s also a perfect time for storytelling, and the one we tell is worthy of a showy Hollywood venue. An autocratic ruler. An unjust persecution. A band of brave resisters who, against all odds, win the day. A tale of oppression transformed, a subject people regaining hope and freedom.

It is a story of courage in the face of cruelty. And miracles, too, of course. God’s eternal light, with only a day’s worth of oil to keep it burning, lasts for eight, until new oil can be found.

Stories can be told in so many ways. Even one word can contain many meanings. Consider the following:

חנה to settle oneself, to rest: Body, making, settling the candles in the Hanukkiah
חֲנֻכָּה dedication, consecration: Heart, forming. Recite the blessings, light the candles.
חנך  to learn, to make experienced: Mind, knowing. What do you see, recall, know, experience in the flickering of the flames?
חֵן  grace: Emanation, being. What is the revelation to be found in the light of the candles?

This year, consider trying out a new Hanukkah tradition. Light candles, settle down with family and friends, and ask: What do each of the words embedded in Hanukkah mean to us?

Consider what they ask us to do: Rest, dedicate ourselves anew, learn, give and receive grace. All beautiful, all worthy of our time and effort.

Shabbat Shalom and Chag Sameach!

Rabbi Barbara

Shabbat-O-Gram – Birthing Death

Posted by Rabbi Thiede on December 5, 2014   |   Comments Off on Shabbat-O-Gram – Birthing Death
Rachel's Tomb

Rachel’s Tomb

This weekend’s parsha begins with the fear of death. Jacob is about to meet his brother Esau after decades of separation. He can expect trouble; he left home, in part, because of Esau’s murderous rage.

There is a near fight-to the death, too. The night before the brothers meet, Jacob battles with a mysterious stranger – angel of God? God, Godself? A man he does not know? The spirit of his brother? The battle goes on through the night – ceasing only at daybreak. Jacob is freed and renamed.

But the cascading encounter with death continues as we read on. Death is no longer threatened, but real. We hear that Rebecca’s nurse has died. Just a few verses later, Rachel dies while giving birth to her second son, Benjamin. Finally, near the close of the parsha, Isaac dies.

Torah records these deaths in different tonalities. Deborah’s death is almost an aside; the fact that she is mentioned is important – the mystery behind why she was important enough to merit mention goes unsolved.

Rachel’s death is a scene of anguish: Her own midwife rejoices and tells her: “Do not fear you will have another son!” But as she breathes her last, she names her son according to his birth: Ben-oni, son of my sorrow. Jacob renames the boy immediately: He called him Benjamin, evoking a wholly different idea. Son, “ben” of days “ Son, of long life “yamin (m).”

Finally, we read of Isaac’s death, a death which brings together his once-warring sons. They bury him together. He is “gathered to his kin.”

So often, it is said, Judaism has little to nothing to say about the process of death or what might come after it. Yet, there is much in our tradition that offers thoughtful comfort. We do not subscribe to a vision of hell awaiting the wicked. We do not espouse eternal torment and everlasting punishment. But what do our traditions imagine?

Inheritance of spirit and soul: We would not say, “may her (his) memory be a blessing” otherwise. But we have traditions in which those who have died communicate with those still living. And there are Jewish ideas around a kind of reincarnation.

Our tradition mostly speaks to what is – what we face, what we must do on this earth, in our time. Yet Judaism does have something to say about birthing death with hope.

And that will be the subject of my sermon tonight. Please join us at Piedmont Unitarian Universalist Church, 9704 Mallard Creek Road at 7 p.m. Oneg follows.