CHANUKAH 2002/5763-ANOTHER CELEBRATION

November 30, 2002

Rabbi Edward Paul Cohn

Temple Sinai

New Orleans, Louisiana

I'm telling you, Chanukah has really changed from my boyhood days! Its complete American transformation was thrillingly obvious as, last Sunday, I observed the scene during our Temple Sinai Sisterhood Chanukah Bazaar. In the midst of that unmistakable latka fragrance, my eyes took in the colorful array of unprecedented menorah variety!

Believe me when I tell you that there was every kind of menorah to be seen and sold! We had the traditional and the contemporary, the glass and the metal, the wood and the ceramic, the oil and the candle, the candle and the electric, the miniature and the gigantic, the child's menorah and the adult menorah, expensive menorahs and very reasonable ones.

And how about the incredible variety of greeting cards, Chanukah door decorations, napkins, banners, decorator beeswax candles, wrapping papers, baubles, guest towels, paperweights and bubble bath? Everything for Chanukah.

It wasn't so in the old days, and by old days I mean the 1950s and 60s. Candles pretty much came in one variety in a blue box, but at least the colors were far more vibrant than I noticed they are this year. Menorahs were of 4 basic types: either razor-sharp tin jobs, Israeli blue-green metal ones, or the costly antique sterling silver or, sometimes, antique brass ones handed down from prior generations of one's family. Wrapping paper in the old days came in blue or white and Hallmark Cards of Kansas City marketed perhaps ten or twelve assorted Chanukah designs.

There certainly were no television specials during prime time and of course there was no cable. Adam Sandler was 20 years from being born, there were no popular Chanukah songs, no Chanukah cookbooks, no cute-talking menorah videos, and Jews spent a lot of their time explaining the story of our holiday to well-meaning Christians who hadn't a clue what it was all about or even how to pronounce it: "cha-new-kah" being the most popular attempt!

Mind you, all of this was a huge step ahead from my parents' day. They remembered very well how Chanukah candles used to come like Model Ts in any color you wanted, so long as it was orange (the Model T, of course, came in any color you wanted, so long as it was black). And those orange candles used to stick together in their white box, having to be pried apart with a knife.

It is heartwarming and amazing how popular Chanukah has become. I haven't mentioned dreidels so far, and our Chanukah Bazaar certainly had dreidels fashioned out of any material you can imagine except clay! But do you know that there are Christian friends of mine who have also mastered the dreidel game? I guess we're really a cosmopolitan society. But in any event, Chanukah is the world's most universally-observed Jewish holiday.

So what's the secret of its popularity? Many say it owes its appeal to its proximity to Christmas. Others claim it's because of the gifts or its appeal to children, but whatever, Chanukah is a fabulous, colorful, enjoyable, tasty, loving, triumphant, and don't forget, historically verifiable Jewish holy occasion.

As this is the first night, perhaps we ought to review the basics. Everyone remembers the heroism of Judah, called the Maccabee, but Chanukah really began with his daddy. Do you remember Judah's old man's name? Mattathias. That's right! Mattathias is the one who really began what turned into a revolution. And this revolution wound up preserving Jewish political independence for about another century.

Mattathias began his rebellion against the iron fist rule of Antiochus and his Syrian-Greeks in the year 167 BCE. And where do we turn in the Torah to read the details? It isn't in the Torah, is it?

Okay, so in what book of the Bible, then, do we find detailed the exciting and inspiring events of Chanukah? Chanukah isn't mentioned in the Jewish Bible! It's the Apocrypha, in the books of Maccabees where we have elaborated the pivotal role which Mattathias played in history's first recorded battle for religious liberty.

Antiochus, like most tyrants before and since, was intent on unifying his power by obliterating the cultures and faith traditions practiced by all of those whom he ruled. We Jews and our Judaism were especially targeted for destruction.

Everyone knows the story of how Antiochus plundered the Temple in Jerusalem, how he set up altars within it for idolatrous worship, how he ordered the end of Sabbath and festival observance and outlawed circumcision. Those who did not comply with his orders "that all should be one people, and each should give up his particular customs," were arrested, tortured, and then put to death.

Mattathias witnessed all of this and recognized, much to his horror, that the tyranny which was imposed, this attempt to destroy the independence of thought among his fellow Jews, would spell the end of Judaism. We read in the book of Maccabees how, on seeing a fellow Jew bowing down to a statue of Antiochus, Mattathias was so filled with rage that he grabbed a sword and killed the wayward Jew.

In Mattathias' mind, Antiochus was evil not only because he used brute force to get his way, but because he enlisted collaborators among the subject people-in this case, the Jews-and forced them to think alike, to act alike, to worship alike so that there would be no independence of mind or spirit. Antiochus liked the human being fettered and imprisoned by limitations.

You see what happened was that the battle which Mattathias, and later Judah and his brothers, led was one which was aimed at least as much against their fellow Jews who were collaborators and who were enjoying the heathen and pagan ways of the Greeks, forsaking their own traditions, every bit as much as the war was waged against the Syrian-Greek soldiers. The Maccabees understood something which we dare not forget: it is lethal to stand idly by while freedom is debased for political expediency. One dare not sell one's soul in the name of uniformity. And so, driven by righteous rage, Mattathias proclaimed publicly:

Even if all the nations that live under the rule of the king obey him and depart from their traditions, yet I and my sons and my brothers will live by the covenant of our people. . . . We will not obey the king's commands by turning aside from our religion to the right hand or to the left.

And it was those words which lit the fire of the Maccabean revolt almost 2,200 years ago. But they are more than just words. They are the battle cry of the human spirit against all decrees of tyranny, even the ones that we witness today.

I must tell you, and you may very well disagree with me, and that's your right, but I even detect a disturbing tendency within our own free society, post-9/11, to rush to conform. I sense an unwarranted and unwholesome suspicion of those who express differences of opinion. I will readily admit that our president and his administration have done, in the main, an admirable job. But I do not believe that they are beyond criticism or that we need necessarily join the throng in following their every desire and submitting to their every viewpoint. Prior to 9/11 no one would have accused George W. Bush of excess gray matter, and I don't believe he has transformed himself in that area.

The current senatorial election in our own state similarly shows a suspicion of those who differ in their thought. One cannot be conservative enough or pro-life enough or ideologically pure enough to qualify for the electorate support in this state. A record of moderation, reason, hard work, and, by and large, support of the current national administration, has nevertheless been characterized as less than loyal and insufficiently supportive of true Louisiana and American ideals. Many of the arguments and attacks that have been made during this United States senatorial election campaign are, in my opinion, examples of extremism--unworthy, inaccurate, and misleading.

We find ourselves living in a suspicious society in which snide remarks of cynics, who snarl at every proposal for economic or social change which might just help end human misery and lift the level of education, masquerade as responsible policy.

Those who, through conscience or religious faith, subscribe to and support the agenda of the so-called "pro-life" constituency have managed to arrogate for themselves the moral high ground as their exclusive property, and discount and demonize anyone whose religious definition of "life" differs even by degrees from their own.

Yes, I am fired up and annoyed by the intemperate mood of our times which deprecates independence of thought and has no real desire or will to seriously entertain dialogue with and debate the views of the minority- whether it be the advisability of the war on Iraq, the abortion issue, church-state issues, prayer in public schools, gay rights, taxation, Social Security, or whatever. Morons know it all! Intelligent people discuss, debate and challenge their own views in the light of others.

America has always been a place in which the minority was free to express its opinion, and those who thought differently from the majority were not automatically branded and labeled as lesser Americans, unpatriotic, or irreligious.

Mattathais' victory against such tyranny of thought is at the essence of Chanukah. In the flickering flames of the menorah is still kindled the eternal message of the sanctity of human freedom and the emancipation of the human spirit. And so may it ever be!

Amen.