Page 19 - HaMizrachi #15 2019 Chanuka USA

Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks

books of Maccabees. But that is not special. Something worth fighting festival itself. Chanukah, from the word
how the story was ultimately told for. Judaism, with its emphasis on the chanuch, means re-dedication. That is
within the Jewish tradition, as it was sanctification of life, and the belief what the Maccabees did to the Temple.
ruled that the two books of Macca- that every human being was created in They rededicated it, as described in
bees, and others under the same title, G-d’s image, held eternal truths that the books of Maccabees. Yet over
should be called Sefarim Chitzoni’im, we could not abandon. This was the time, Chanukah became connected to
apocryphal works, and kept out of the unique distinction between the cul- the word, a word meaning education.
Bible. The Chanukah story that is told ture of the Greeks and the world of the What we re-dedicated was not a phys-
instead is a very different one, with a Torah and Judaism. As a result, Jews ical building – the Temple – but living
powerful message. have always known that the real battle embodiments of Judaism, namely our
is not necessarily fought on the phys- children, our students, the people to
The Talmud tells us that in the first ical battlefield with physical weapons, whom we teach and hand on our heri-
century, in the last days of the Second but rather in the hearts and minds of tage and values.
Temple, a Rabbi called Yehoshua Ben future generations.
Gamla established a network of schools From being the festival of a military
throughout Israel. The result of this So Judaism and the Jewish people victory, Chanukah became the festival
was that from the age of six, every became a faith and a nation no longer of a spiritual and civilizational one.
child in the country received a public- focusing on its military heroes, but on
ly-funded universal education. This its spiritual ones. It became a civiliza- I believe this history of our history has
was the first education system of its tion rooted in texts, and in teachers, a message for us all. It teaches us this
kind anywhere in the world, and also and in houses of study. We became the fundamental truth, as relevant to our
a clear indication of the now famil- people whose heroes were teachers, lives today as ever before: to defend a
iarly Jewish commitment to education whose citadels were schools, and whose country physically you need an army,
and to ensuring our children are liter- passion was learning and the life of the but to defend a civilization you need
ate in their heritage. According to the mind. The end result was that Judaism education, you need educators, and
Talmud, Rabbi Yehoshua ben Gamla’s did survive and thrive throughout the you need schools. Those are the things
memory is blessed, because without centuries, whereas Ancient Greece, the that kept the Jewish spirit alive and
his intervention the Torah would have Greece of Athens, the Greece of Alex- the Menorah of Jewish values burning
been forgotten in Israel. Without him, ander the Great, declined. In fact, it was throughout the centuries with an ever-
there would have been no survival of only a short time after the events of the lasting light. Often what seems at the
Judaism and ultimately no Jews. Chanukah story that Greece began its time to be the headline news, the mil-

What Rabbi Yehoshua Ben Gamla and decline, and Rome rose to take its place. itary victory, is, in the hindsight of his-
tory, secondary to the cultural victory
the other Sages understood, and what That is the message of Chanukah, and of handing your values on to the next
was not understood at the time of Cha- to articulate our story, we focus in a generation.
nukah itself, was that the real battle rather beautiful and symbolic way on
against the Greeks was not a military just one tiny detail of the original chain If we do that, we will ensure that our
one, but a cultural one. At the time, of events: that one cruse of pure, unde- children and theirs will light up the
the Greeks were the world’s greatest in filed oil was found by the Maccabees world. Chanukah Sameach!
many fields. They were unparalleled in among the wreckage and defilements
their advances in art, in architecture, of the Temple, just enough to light
in literature, in drama, in philosophy. the Menorah until more oil could be
Even today, their achievements have sourced.
never been surpassed. But Jews none-
theless believed, and surely history One of the most interesting aspects of Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks is Emeritus
has borne this out, that there is within this shifting perspective from the orig- Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew
Judaism, within ancient Israel and still inal way of telling the story to the cur- Congregations of the Commonwealth
within its heritage to today, something rent way is reflected in the name of the @RabbiSacks · www.RabbiSacks.org

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