The Candles of Chanukah

Transcription

1 The Candles of Chanukah A Story from Jewish History (Version 2a) A Sunday service led by the Reverend Michael Walker, Interim Minister Presented on Chanukah December 13, 2015, at the Unitarian Church of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

2 CALL TO WORSHIP (by Rev. Michael Walker) Today we will learn about the Jewish Festival of Lights, And why Jewish people light a menorah each year. It is to honor the historical dedication of a sacred space, And so it is with our UU Flaming Chalice, too. Created as a symbol to help Jewish people during WWII, It now sanctifies our own sacred spaces. It is in honor of this historical relationship, The Jewish and Unitarian friendship, That we dedicate the lighting of our Chalice today. May it ever be so and blessed be you all! MEDITATION (by Rev. Michael Walker) You are invited into a time of meditation, to be followed by a period of silence. The Holy Days of Chanukah celebrate a story of a family, persevering against great adversity, and about how this family and others believed a particular place to be special, to be sacred. Consider for a moment: Have you or members of your family faced adversity? How did you overcome it? Do you have a place that is sacred to you or your family? Perhaps a place that feels like home, a place to renew oneself after the adversity? In this dark season of winter, I hope that you and yours gather in your sacred place, and may it be good. May it ever be so and blessed be you all! December 13, 2015 Page 2 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg

3 READING: Eight Little Candles 1 I thought of all the wondrous things the Maccabees had done I lit a little candle And then there was one. I thought of Jewish pioneers with shovels, rakes and picks; And lit another candle And then there were six. I thought of all the wondrous things that I myself might do; And lit another candle And then there were two. I thought of white as white stars, of blue as blue as heaven; I lit another candle And then there were seven. I thought of Eretz Yisrael, the Maccabees, and me; I lit another candle And then there were three. I thought of the great Lord our God who guides us early and late And lit another candle And then there were eight. I thought of Jewish heroes that fell in peace and war, And lit another candle And then there were four. I thought of young Judeans all pledged to serve and strive; I lit another candle And then there were five. 1 Beilenson, Suzanne and Rabbi Daniel D. Wolk. The Eight Nights of Hanukah. White Plains, NY: Peter Pauper Press, December 13, 2015 Page 3 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg

4 OFFERING [Introduction] If you are here for the first time, we invite you to The Candles of Chanukah A Story from Jewish History Reverend Michael Walker let the offering basket pass you by, because you are our honored guest. And if you have made this your spiritual home, we thank you for your continuing generosity. Every month, we also collect donations during the Offering to support a worthy cause. This month, our Share-the-Plate Recipient is Shalom House. If you are writing a check, please specify on the Memo line whether this is for your Pledge, an offering to UCH, or for the Share-the-Plate recipient. Thank you, all, for your generosity. This morning s offering will now be received. For those who might not have been here last week, this month I m doing a series of interfaith sermons that are stories about people who have overcome great hardships. Today, I m going to talk about perseverance against power and faith against tyranny, in the lives of the Jewish people (led by the Maccabeans) in ancient Jerusalem and the surrounding area. It is also the story of the origin of the Jewish holiday, Chanukah. It is my intention to honor the heritage of the Jewish people, but not to misappropriate their customs and rituals. So, although I have a menorah here, which I will explain, I m December 13, 2015 Page 4 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg

5 not going to say all of the blessings to go with it, because they are not my prayers to say and I am not a Rabbi. The story on which these customs are based is recorded in ancient scrolls, called the Books of the Maccabees. They contain the story of struggles of Jews living in the lands of the Levant region in the 2 nd century Before the Common Era (BCE). Levant is a less controversial term for a region in the Middle East, which covers lands that have variously been called Israel, Canaan, Judah or Judea, and Palestine. I use Levant because it is less charged with modern political implications. death of Alexander the Great. As Alexander lay ill and soon to die, he had called his generals to him, and divided up his empire among them so the generals and their sons became kings in lands that were not their own. Of particular interest to the Descendants of Israel were the Ptolemies, a Greek family that became Pharoahs of Egypt; and the Seleucids, also Greek, who came to rule Syria. In the generations after the Ptolemies and Seleucids had first come to occupy their thrones, they fought back and forth, and the lands of the Levant changed hands several times. The Levant region, which lays between Egypt and Syria, was important because of its rich and strategic Mediterranean coastline. It was To put this account of the Maccabeans into historical context, this happened about 150 years after the really Syria s access to the coastline with sea and trade routes, or Egypt preventing Syria from having access, December 13, 2015 Page 5 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg

6 that these kings fought over the fact that Jewish and other people lived there was of much less concern. Our story has two main characters. The antagonist and power-player is the Seleucid king of Syria, Antiochus Epiphanes, also known as Antiochus IV (the Fourth); and the protagonist and under-dog hero is Judas Maccabeus, The Seleucids were Greek Pagans, and followed the customs and religious practices of their ancestral homeland. King Antiochus declared that all the people of his Syrian kingdom would also follow his Greek customs and worship his Greek gods, and this included the Jewish people in Jerusalem. son of the High Priest of the Great Temple of Jerusalem, and a member of the family Hasmonean. Maccabeus was not his surname, but rather a title conferred upon him by his followers that means The Hammerer, which was probably a reference to Judas military exploits. In the time of Alexander the Great, the people had been allowed to have local rule and maintain their cultural and religious customs. However, by the time of our story, the Seleucid rulers did not allow such freedom. In the Levant, the Greek-Syrian armies of Antiochus were in control. They conquered, pillaged, did horrible things, until the people surrendered. The Seleucids built a big citadel for their troops right next to the Great Temple of the Jews, and a large school to educate people in the Greek manner. Forced cultural immersion. Some of the people, bowing to the force of power in the region, adopted the customs of the Greek December 13, 2015 Page 6 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg

7 culture. It is said in the Book of Maccabees that many Jewish leaders led their people to develop a covenant with the Gentiles in order to have peace in the Levant region. This was actually a long, historical process known as Hellenization, and was a major factor in Middle Eastern history for many centuries. But the Maccabean opinion was that those Jewish leaders were renegades, because they did not stand by the laws of the Jewish God and his priests, unto their very deaths. Earlier Jewish priests had negotiated away national sovereignty in order to be allowed to worship as they pleased. But, when Antiochus IV came to the throne, the Jews lost even that. So, there were at least two very different movements among the Jewish people living in the Levant during the Maccabean era. One was to steadfastly live by the laws of tradition, or die trying. The other was to obey the king and adopt new customs. It seems to me that this black & white, no shades of grey, way of looking at the world is still very present in the modern-day peoples living in the Levant region, and elsewhere in the world. At that time, Jewish religion was suppressed, and the armies had looted the temple, stealing all the sacred and precious objects within. They even sacrificed pigs an unclean animal in Jewish belief on the altar. To the priests and Jewish people, their temple had been defiled. So it came to be that after many years of bemoaning the persecution of his people, the elderly High Priest, Mattathias Hasmonean had had enough. He spoke to his people and his five adult sons, condemned the actions of December 13, 2015 Page 7 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg

8 the Seleucids, and even their presence in the Holy City. He also condemned the Jews he felt were traitors, for not dying for their Jewish faith. and has not seized her spoils? All her adornment has been taken away; no longer free, she has become a slave. And see, our holy place, our beauty, These are the words of Mattathias, from the First Book of Maccabees: Alas! Why was I born to see this, the ruin of my people, the ruin of the holy city, and to live there when it was given over to the enemy, the sanctuary given over to aliens? Her temple has become like a person without honor; Her glorious vessels have been carried into exile. Her infants have been killed in her streets, her youths by the sword of the foe. and our glory have been laid waste; the Gentiles have profaned them. Why should we live any longer? Then Mattathias and his sons tore their clothes, put on sackcloth, and mourned greatly. (1 Macc 2:4-14) This may seem quite dramatic, but perhaps that is what was needed at the time. So, it came to pass that the Hasmonean family decided to leave Jerusalem, moving to Modein, a small town out in the desert. What nation has not inherited her palaces December 13, 2015 Page 8 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg

9 But the defiance of the High Priest had been reported to the Seleucids, and they tracked the Hasmoneans to their small town, and commanded Mattathias to obey the will of the king. This was important, you see, because Mattathias was from the priestly class and had been an important person in Jerusalem. The Seleucids needed the High Priest to bow to their will, in order to convince other Jewish people to do the same. But, Mattathias stood with his five sons, in defiance, and exhorted faithful Jews of the town to follow him, and they fled into the desert, escaping the Seleucid troops. Over time, people heard of this and many joined the Hasmoneans in hiding. As Mattathias was the priest of his growing movement, his son Judas, called Maccabeus, became the general. They grew an army and became determined to bring the Jewish people back into covenant with their God, and overthrow the covenant with the Gentiles that had been brokered by the so-called renegade Jews. Now, lest we believe that the Jewish people in the Maccabean era were all victims, there is another side to the story. This army that Judas built, by his father s command, was sent out to fight. Not only did they engage Seleucid troops in conflicts, but they also went among the Jewish people in the towns throughout the Levant. They hunted and killed renegade Jews, for the crime of making peace with the enemy. They examined boys, and forcibly circumcised those who had not been because from ancient times, this was the mark of the December 13, 2015 Page 9 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg

10 Jewish covenant with God. The followers of Judas became known as the Maccabeans, and they were quite controversial, even among Jewish people at that time and place in history. Thus came a period in the long history of the Jewish people, known as the Maccabean Revolt. I m not going to give you a blow-by-blow of the entire war that followed. Simply, there were many battles, with victories on both sides. For every Maccabean victory And, as this war dragged on, remember that the priest Mattathias was quite old, and finally the long years and running in the desert took their toll on him. So, much as Alexander had done, Mattathias called his sons and followers to him, and he passed his power and authority to his son, Judas Maccabeus, and then he died. The brothers of Judas and others who had come to join his army gladly followed him he must have been quite a charismatic leader, to draw so many people into the desert to join what was basically a guerrilla army. over the Seleucids, more Jewish men would come to join the army of Judas Maccabeus. And, for every victory of the Seleucids, more Jewish men joined the Gentiles, in hopes of ending the war and bringing peace to their land through capitulation. Similar to the American Civil War, some families became quite divided in their loyalties. But, over the years, Judas led his army well, and they achieved some very important and symbolic victories, such as when they successfully drove the Seleucids out of territory of Galilee and liberated the December 13, 2015 Page 10 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg

11 Galilean Jews. And then Gilead. And then Jerusalem, and Hebron and Philistia. Until all the lands of the Levant had been liberated. King Antiochus, whose armies had also just been driven out of Babylon, which came after being driven out of Egypt, was astounded that the weak Jewish people were able to defeat his forces and drive him from the Levant. And so, as had happened with Alexander, and then with Mattathias, now a broken Antiochus took to his bed in despair and sickness. He then called his friends to his bedside. In the Maccabean account, it is said that King Antiochus repented of the wrongs he had done in the Jewish temple and elsewhere, and then he died. His kingdom passed to his young son, Antiochus V, who had not the power or experience to lead troops against the Jewish people again. In this vacuum of power, the Maccabeans proclaimed their leader, Judas Hasmonean, to be the King of Judea, also called the Maccabean Kingdom. The Hasmonean dynasty the descendants of the High Priest, Mattathias ruled an independent Jewish kingdom for several generations. That is, until the Romans came and put Herod in power, but that is a story for another day. At this time, Judas had much work to do to restore the Kingdom of Judea to its former glory in the time of Israel. Being the son of a High Priest, he knew where he had to start, to bring hope back into the hearts of his people and to restore their faith. It was time to cleanse the temple, to remove all signs of the defilement, and to re-dedicate it to the glory of their God. By the way, the December 13, 2015 Page 11 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg

12 Hebrew word for dedication is Chanukah. And now you know where this long story was leading us. was only enough to burn their lamps for one day, but their rededication ritual required that they worship, sing, and burn lamps for eight days straight. Upon the altar, the Seleucids had sacrificed swine, which was a defilement. So the huge stone altar was removed, and a new one built in its place. The walls that were falling down were shored up, the overgrowth was removed, and the place once again beautified. The Seleucid army citadel that had been built on sacred ground was torn down. The priests prepared to rededicate the temple, and their rituals called for burning oil lamps. It was at this point that the Maccabeans and their priests came upon a new problem. In the temple storerooms, that had been looted, only one vessel of oil that had been blessed by a High Priest remained. This [LIGHT SHAMASH] Ah, but the Jews fresh from their victories and newfound independence had faith in God to provide, so they began their rituals, anyway. They lit a lamp [LIGHT CANDLE] and they sang praises and hallelujahs, and continued on in the practice of their faith. And the next day came, and to their amazement, the one-day supply of holy oil had been replenished, and they lit the lamps again. [LIGHT CANDLE] They continued on with the celebration and ritual, with food, music and the reading of the sacred scrolls, the Torah. When the next day came, they were again astonished to find the oil had been December 13, 2015 Page 12 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg

13 miraculously replenished... [LIGHT CANDLE] And again... [LIGHT CANDLE] And again... [LIGHT CANDLE] And yet, another day of miracle... [LIGHT CANDLE] And again... [LIGHT CANDLE] And again... [LIGHT CANDLE] For eight days of ritual, they had enough oil, when they started with only a oneday supply. The Maccabeans took this turn of events to be a sign from God that he was pleased that they had retaken perseverance and faith. Although my faith, your faith, may be different in content from that of the Maccabeans, I still believe we can learn from this story. Both, in admiration for all they did to achieve independence, but also as a cautionary tale, regarding the way in which they turned on their own people with violence. Ultimately, they sought freedom and peace. Let that be the lesson for today. May it ever be so and blessed be you all! the Holy Land, to be ruled by the Chosen People, who live and worship according to their Law. To commemorate this event, the Jewish people have been celebrating the Festival of Lights, Chanukah, ever since. There are lessons here for us to learn, about December 13, 2015 Page 13 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg

14 BENEDICTION (by Rev. Michael Walker) Whether or not you believe in miracles, I implore you to believe in something... Love is good. Love those in your life. Hold them close, keep them safe. Seek to avoid violence, to promote peace, To live in freedom and to teach acceptance. Even to your enemy. Hold them close, keep them safe. How else shall this miracle happen? This is the lesson for a wintery season of darkness. Love openly, freely, without reservation. Therein lays the miracle of this season. May it ever be so and blessed be you all! December 13, 2015 Page 14 Unitarian Church of Harrisburg