I wanted to give the very
basic Hanukkah story to start so we have some context for the contemplations to
come:
It begins with Antiochus
III, the King of Syria, who reigned from 3538 to 3574 (222-186 B.C.E.). When
the Romans started penalizing him with taxes he passed the pressure down on his
kingdom, including the Jews. He gets succeeded by his brother Antiochus IV who
wants assimilation among the kingdom, so he forbids the Jews to study Torah and
practice their traditions. The priest Matatthias and a group of dedicated Jews
flee to the hills of Judea . The Syrians come after them and a battle
ensues where many on both sides die. Mattathias elects Judah to lead the
defense and calls him “Maccabee"
a word composed of the initial letters of the four Hebrew words Mi Kamocha Ba’eilim Adonai, "Who is
like You, God.", usually translated as “hammer”. There are a series
of battles (of the smaller Judean army against the bigger Syrian one) and the
Maccabees triumph. They head to Jerusalem to liberate the temple, clean
it up, find only one small vessel of oil deemed pure enough for the
rededication and it burns miraculously for 8 days. The priests then
appoint these 8 days for celebration and thanksgiving.
This is a deep and rich
holiday. Let’s start with the 8 days - in
Torah the number 8 is the number that refers to the world that is
"above" nature - a higher consciousness. Rabbi Samson Rafael
Hersch teaches that you can compare it to an octave on the piano - if you play
the note C an octave above middle C it is the same not but in a higher reality.
Turned sideways it represents infinity. The number 8 in Judaism refers to
a higher reality world, the world beyond the created world, the world of
eternal connection to God (we name and circumcise baby boys on the 8th
day after their birth, Shavuot, the holiday when we celebrate receiving the
Torah, is the 8th week after Passover, 8 days of Hannukah, etc.). So Hanukkah
connects us to this aspect of our awareness.
The Syrian Greeks of the
Hanukah story were interested only in the physical, in what was visible on the
outside and graspable with human intelligence. They brought in idols to
decorate the temple, which is forbidden in Jewish practice, but are of course
aesthetically pleasing. My teacher Diane
Bloomfield says “Judaism (and yoga!) is dedicated to the connection of the
physical with the spiritual and intangible. It teaches an alignment and
connection of the physical with the spiritual.” What the Maccabees were
fighting was the disconnect from the spiritual. The conquering Syrians
didn't want to know the realm of the spirit, which is why they wouldn't let the
Jews study Torah and practice their religion in other ways. They wanted
to disconnect the Jews from the world of higher consciousness because it didn’t
make sense to them. Hanukkah is really
about returning to the realm of the spirit. Very interesting considering
how we celebrate Hanukkah in America, right? Again, it’s not a bad thing
to be concerned with the physical – we are embodied beings and neither yoga or
Judaism support an ascetic lifestyle and yet both seek balance. It’s not a “bad” thing to have things, give
gifts, dress up, and celebrate , it’s just that when those things become the
temple that we pray at that we start to lose touch with our spiritual selves
and our connection to the Divine. It’s
like going to a yoga class that is too based in the world of the physical,
concerned only with the physical practice – there is something missing.
The word Hanukkah is of
course a Hebrew word. Hebrew is a really
interesting language because every word has a 3 letter root and a number
associated with it. We often learn a
lot about the deeper meanings of Torah by breaking down the words
themselves. When we break down Hanukkah
down can mean several things:
Chana (the “ch” is not pronounced like the English, but a
guttural sound in the back of the throat): to rest in, to dwell in, to settle
Chen: one of the 8 synonyms in Hebrew for beauty, it can also
mean grace or favor – the aspect of beauty that expresses itself through the
aesthetic of graceful symmetry (so yogic, right?!)
Cah: this is a word that hints at a higher realm, the
un-contracted light of God. Its gematria
(numeric value) is 25 which is an important number mystically: the 25th word of
the Torah is light, Hanukkah is on 25th of the month of Kislev, the world was
created on the 25th day of the month of Elul.
So we take this to mean that it is the day that God began to create the
physical world, and it began with creating “light”.
So putting that all together
Chana-cah means: (time to) rest
in/dwell in the (in-dwelling) light that is God, or resting in the grace of
God.
On Hanukkah the main mitzva we practice is to light the menorah (a mitzvah is a practice designed to bring
God into the physical world). And we are required to put the menorah in a
window so the light shines outward into the darkness for the length of the
holiday. The menorah represents the inner light of “cah”. The Torah teaches that on the first day God created
light, but it wasn't until day 4 that God creates the sun, moon and stars.
So what is this light then? Again from my teacher Diane Bloomfield: it is
the or haganuz (hidden or concealed
light) - an extract from the hidden light of the first day of creation. It
is the light of wisdom and awareness and consciousness (like paramshiva in the
Tantra philosophy we study and practice at Shree). We know that every
one of us holds a spark of this light inside ourselves and this is the light we
bring forth on Hanukkah when we light the candles. This is the light that can guide us in
meaningful holiday practices of celebration with family and friends, of giving
and receiving.
The great yoga teacher BKS Iyengar
says "Alignment is the even distribution of consciousness through the
entire pose." When we practice yoga and light up our bodies with awareness
we become the embodiment of the or
haganuz. The 8 days of Hanukkah are the celebration of the most essential
Jewish teaching that the infinite God is penetrating and manifesting through
the realm of this finite, created world. It is up to us to prepare
fitting vessels for containing and revealing this light. The physical form creates the vessel to hold
the light. We connect to the in-dwelling presence of the Divine, and
through the practice we shine it out like the menorah in the window.
So as you celebrate this
last day of Hannukah, or move forward towards Christmas and New Years, feel the
inner light take the form of your outer shape on the inside and let it guide
you in all you do. In the Anusara
invocation we say satchitananda murtaye, which
means my inner most brightness takes the form of my outer body. Let your inner brightness light up these
darkening days of winter. Nurture the
spark of the or haganuz inside you so
it can burn a little brighter. Let your practice both on and off the mat be a
rededication of the temple of your body, mind and heart.
Wishing you happy and
blessed holidays!
