麻豆社

Good Morning and Happy Chanukkah, the Jewish festival of lights.

In my teens I would often light the candles with my grandparents. I鈥檇 watch their reflections in the window as they burnt on the eight-branched Chanukkiah candelabrum, and the reflections of the reflections. They felt like testaments of hope spreading through the darkness, affectionate messages, fingers reaching out to touch across generations.

With dusk early and nights long, lockdowns and tier rules, though essential, feel hard to bear. Loneliness cuts deep wounds and despair can follow. I feel for older people: what鈥檚 Chanukkah or Christmas without all one鈥檚 family and friends? I feel for young people; where鈥檚 the safe world with a place for all?
It鈥檚 a tough time to find hope, - which is why it matters so much.

Chanukkah commemorates Maccabean victories long ago. But the rabbis weren鈥檛 interested in the wars; instead, they told the story of the light.
When those Maccabees regained the ravaged Jerusalem temple, they searched the ruins until they found one single jar of oil. Insufficient as this quantity was, they lit the Menorah, which burnt miraculously for eight days.

The accuracy of this account may be doubtful, but not the truth it expresses. However broken our world, we should try not to give up. There is sacred light in everything, the mystics taught; though hidden, it is present in all life.

However small a source of light we find, we should kindle it. Once we do so, the lamps of hope, courage and kindness always burn far longer than we imagine. They reach across the darkness, inspiring others who in turn remotivate us. The scientists who found the Covid vaccines in which we all hope surely had dispiriting days, yet their stamina kept burning.

Yesterday, the Jewish and Uyghur communities lit Chanukkah candles in solidarity, determined that the sacred human spirit would overcome oppression, internment, slavery and degradation.

But it鈥檚 not just in major concerns; hope burns in every act of kindness. I was five when my mother died and have few memories. But I recall how afterwards my father took me for a walk, passing a small garden centre. The owner must have enquired because I saw my father shake his head. The man disappeared for a moment, returned, bent down and, smiling, gave me a primrose.

I don鈥檛 know if you鈥檙e alive, garden-centre man, but your light still burns on the Chanukiah in my heart.

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