Chanuka and Purim
(originally distributed by email, July 2005)
Chanuka and Purim are related in many ways, especially in that they both relate to our freedom from oppression, but in many ways they are two opposite sides of the same coin.
Every Chanuka we indulge in a lot of rhetoric against our brethren of a less-religious bent (and now we spread it around so it is Chanuka all year long). In speeches and drashot, letters and emails, we all remind each other that the fight and the victory on Chanuka was against mityavnim, the ancient version of today's chilonim. We are reminded that the rallying cry "Mi LaShem Ali" was used twice in Jewish History, at the Golden Calf and at Chanuka, before Jew killed Jew in the name of God. Some of those things we hear and read sound frighteningly not like metaphors but like actual calls to bloody civil war. The eagerness and enthusiasm that some of us have to kill Arabs, seems to be transferred to our fellow Jews; we try to justify it in other ways as well, for example by redefining them as "eirev rav" and therefore not really Jewish. And we ignore the many ways in which our current situation does NOT parallel the Chanuka story, as well as the danger that could come if we are wrong. (We also ignore the fact that some of the soldiers who die on the front lines will be dati'im who decided on their own, or received P'sak's from their Rabbis, that obeying orders and participating in the disengagement is less evil than the chance of destroying the nation.)
But then comes Purim, and there is a different paradigm. Purim is another story about assimilated Jews. Virtually the entire Jewish population was chilonim! (And you can bet, some of those who went to Achaveros' party didn't just go IN SPITE OF Kelim from the Mikdash being there, but DAVKA to drink from them.) And unlike Chanuka, NO ONE DIED! Instead, the entire nation did T'shuva! This became the greatest generation of all; even greater than the Jews who left Mitzraim and were present for Matan Torah. For according to Midrash, first of all, 80% of the Jews weren't even worthy to leave Mitzraim, and of those who made it, they only accepted the Torah as an alternative to being buried under Har Sinai! On the other hand, ALL the Jews of Shushan survived, and they all VOLUNTARILY accepted the Torah with Kimu V'Kiblu.
All those chilonim, all those antis, and they all did Tshuva and became holy. Kind of makes you think, doesn't it?
If we truly are, as many believe, approaching the final Geula, and if we truly believe, as we must if we are frum Jews, that we have a hand in shaping that final end, then we must ask ouselves how we wish to see that end come: drenched in the blood of our fellow Jews, or uplifted by the voices of those same Jews crying from the heart, "Na'aseh V'Nishma."
Chanuka and Purim are related in many ways, especially in that they both relate to our freedom from oppression, but in many ways they are two opposite sides of the same coin.
Every Chanuka we indulge in a lot of rhetoric against our brethren of a less-religious bent (and now we spread it around so it is Chanuka all year long). In speeches and drashot, letters and emails, we all remind each other that the fight and the victory on Chanuka was against mityavnim, the ancient version of today's chilonim. We are reminded that the rallying cry "Mi LaShem Ali" was used twice in Jewish History, at the Golden Calf and at Chanuka, before Jew killed Jew in the name of God. Some of those things we hear and read sound frighteningly not like metaphors but like actual calls to bloody civil war. The eagerness and enthusiasm that some of us have to kill Arabs, seems to be transferred to our fellow Jews; we try to justify it in other ways as well, for example by redefining them as "eirev rav" and therefore not really Jewish. And we ignore the many ways in which our current situation does NOT parallel the Chanuka story, as well as the danger that could come if we are wrong. (We also ignore the fact that some of the soldiers who die on the front lines will be dati'im who decided on their own, or received P'sak's from their Rabbis, that obeying orders and participating in the disengagement is less evil than the chance of destroying the nation.)
But then comes Purim, and there is a different paradigm. Purim is another story about assimilated Jews. Virtually the entire Jewish population was chilonim! (And you can bet, some of those who went to Achaveros' party didn't just go IN SPITE OF Kelim from the Mikdash being there, but DAVKA to drink from them.) And unlike Chanuka, NO ONE DIED! Instead, the entire nation did T'shuva! This became the greatest generation of all; even greater than the Jews who left Mitzraim and were present for Matan Torah. For according to Midrash, first of all, 80% of the Jews weren't even worthy to leave Mitzraim, and of those who made it, they only accepted the Torah as an alternative to being buried under Har Sinai! On the other hand, ALL the Jews of Shushan survived, and they all VOLUNTARILY accepted the Torah with Kimu V'Kiblu.
All those chilonim, all those antis, and they all did Tshuva and became holy. Kind of makes you think, doesn't it?
If we truly are, as many believe, approaching the final Geula, and if we truly believe, as we must if we are frum Jews, that we have a hand in shaping that final end, then we must ask ouselves how we wish to see that end come: drenched in the blood of our fellow Jews, or uplifted by the voices of those same Jews crying from the heart, "Na'aseh V'Nishma."
posted by meturgeman | 9:41 PM
