The Sages taught in a baraita: The basic mitzva of Hanukkah is each day to have a light kindled by a person, the head of the household, for one's self and one's household. And the mehadrin, i.e., those who are meticulous in the performance of mitzvot, kindle a light for each and every one in the household. And the mehadrin min hamehadrin, who are even more meticulous, adjust the number of lights daily. Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel disagree as to the nature of that adjustment. Beit Shammai say: On the first day one kindles eight lights and, from there on, gradually decreases the number of lights until, on the last day of Hanukkah, one kindles one light. And Beit Hillel say: On the first day one kindles one light, and from there on, gradually increases the number of lights until, on the last day, one kindles eight lights. Ulla said: There were two amora’im in the West, Eretz Yisrael, who disagreed with regard to this dispute, Rabbi Yosei bar Avin and Rabbi Yosei bar Zevida. One said that the reason for Beit Shammai’s opinion is that the number of lights corresponds to the incoming days, i.e., the future. On the first day, eight days remain in Hanukkah, one kindles eight lights, and on the second day seven days remain, one kindles seven, etc. The reason for Beit Hillel’s opinion is that the number of lights corresponds to the outgoing days. Each day, the number of lights corresponds to the number of the days of Hanukkah that were already observed. And one said that the reason for Beit Shammai’s opinion is that the number of lights corresponds to the bulls of the festival of Sukkot: Thirteen were sacrificed on the first day and each succeeding day one fewer was sacrificed (Numbers 29:12–31). The reason for Beit Hillel’s opinion is that the number of lights is based on the principle: One elevates to a higher level in matters of sanctity and one does not downgrade. Therefore, if the objective is to have the number of lights correspond to the number of days, there is no alternative to increasing their number with the passing of each day. Rabba bar bar Ḥana said that Rabbi Yoḥanan said: There were two Elders in Sidon, and one of them acted in accordance with the opinion of Beit Shammai, and one of them acted in accordance with the opinion of Beit Hillel. Each provided a reason for his actions: One gave a reason for his actions: The number of lights corresponds to the bulls of the Festival. And one gave a reason for his actions: The number of lights is based on the principle: One elevates to a higher level in matters of sanctity and one does not downgrade. The Sages taught in a baraita: It is a mitzva to place the Hanukkah lamp at the entrance to one’s house on the outside, so that all can see it. If one lived upstairs, one places it at the window adjacent to the public domain. And in a time of danger, when the gentiles issued decrees to prohibit kindling lights, one places it on the table and that is sufficient to fulfill their obligation. Rava said: One must kindle another light in addition to the Hanukkah lights in order to use its light, as it is prohibited to use the light of the Hanukkah lights. And if there is a bonfire, one need not light an additional light, as they can use the light of the bonfire. However, if one is an important person, who is unaccustomed to using the light of a bonfire, even though there is a bonfire, they must kindle another light. The Gemara asks: What is Hanukkah, and why are lights kindled on Hanukkah? The Gemara answers: The Sages taught in Megillat Ta’anit: On the twenty-fifth of Kislev, the days of Hanukkah are eight. One may not eulogize on them and one may not fast on them. What is the reason? When the Greeks entered the Sanctuary they defiled all the oils that were in the Sanctuary by touching them. And when the Hasmonean monarchy overcame them and emerged victorious over them, they searched and found only one cruse of oil that was placed with the seal of the High Priest, undisturbed by the Greeks. And there was sufficient oil there to light the candelabrum for only one day. A miracle occurred and they lit the candelabrum from it eight days. The next year the Sages instituted those days and made them holidays with recitation of hallel and special thanksgiving in prayer and blessings.
Rav Dessler's Approach
Jewish law is in accordance with Beit Hillel. We light one candle on the first night and continue increasing and building our potential to the eight candles lit on the last night. Thus, according to this perspective, the law tells us that our first responsibility is to strive for the heights. Mediocrity as a predetermined lifestyle is unacceptable.
However, the ruling of Beit Shammai must also be taken into account. We need to know ourselves and where we are realistically holding. And we must not lose touch with that reality. The last day of Chanukah should be the apex of experience. But all too often it is not.
Taking both opinions into account we emerge with the following Torah philosophy about life: We should strive to reach the greatest heights, even though (or because!) they seem just beyond our reach, yet honor the reality of where we are -- taking proper precautions, proceeding step-by-step, not depending upon miracles -- even as we scale the stairway to heaven.
Rabbi Shalom Noach Berezovsky, the Slonimer Rebbe (1911-2000)
The essence of the Greek war to destroy the Jews was by means of darkening the eyes of Israel. The Greeks knew that they would not be able to successfully defeat the Jews by military means--rather only by darkening their eyes...
There are people who, despite the fact that they involve themselves with Torah and the service of God, walk in darkness. These people do not perceive light and are considered [spiritually] dead. The purpose of human beings is that they see with a clear lens the Divine light which shines within all Creation. As we find in the origins of Creation, ‘and the earth was unformed and void, with darkness over the surface of the deep...and God said, Let there be light; and there was light. God saw that the light was good...’(Gen. 1:2-4) This light was not physical light, but rather Divine light...
Within a glimpse of this light, a person sees the strength of the Creator within all of Creation. [With this vision] a person does not perceive a separated world in which all things are disunited. Rather, [a person sees that] everything is One and that a singular elevated power sustains everything. [When a person sees with this vision] there is no longer any place for ‘unformed and void and darkness.’ And this is the essence of the Greek war--that they darkened the eyes of Israel.
GEMARA: Rav Ḥanan bar Rava says: When are these festivals celebrated? Kalenda is celebrated during the eight days after the winter solstice, and Saturnalia is celebrated during the eight days before the winter solstice. And your mnemonic to remember which festival is that the one that occurs after the solstice is mentioned first in the mishna, and the festival that takes place before the solstice is mentioned after, as in the verse: “You have hemmed me in behind and before, and laid Your Hand upon me” (Psalms 139:5), where the word “before” appears after the term “behind.” With regard to the dates of these festivals, the Sages taught: When Adam the first man saw that the day was progressively diminishing, as the days become shorter from the autumnal equinox until the winter solstice, he did not yet know that this is a normal phenomenon, and therefore he said: Woe is me; perhaps because I sinned the world is becoming dark around me and will ultimately return to the primordial state of chaos and disorder. And this is the death that was sentenced upon me from Heaven, as it is written: “And to dust shall you return” (Genesis 3:19). He arose and spent eight days in fasting and in prayer. Once he saw that the season of Tevet, i.e., the winter solstice, had arrived, and saw that the day was progressively lengthening after the solstice, he said: Clearly, the days become shorter and then longer, and this is the order of the world. He went and observed a festival for eight days. Upon the next year, he observed both these eight days on which he had fasted on the previous year, and these eight days of his celebration, as days of festivities. He, Adam, established these festivals for the sake of Heaven, but they, the gentiles of later generations, established them for the sake of idol worship. The Gemara raises a difficulty: Granted, according to the one who says that the world was created in the month of Tishrei, one can understand why Adam believed that the days were becoming shorter as part of his punishment, as he saw the short days of the winter and had not yet seen the long days of summer. But according to the one who says that the world was created in the month of Nisan, he had already seen the difference between the short days and the long days, as the days in the month of Nisan become progressively longer with the passage of time. The Gemara answers: Although Adam had experienced short days, he had not seen days that were this short, as in the days before the winter solstice. The Sages taught: On the day that Adam the first man was created, when the sun set upon him he said: Woe is me, as because I sinned, the world is becoming dark around me, and the world will return to the primordial state of chaos and disorder. And this is the death that was sentenced upon me from Heaven. He spent all night fasting and crying, and Eve was crying opposite him. Once dawn broke, he said: Evidently, the sun sets and night arrives, and this is the order of the world. He arose and sacrificed a bull whose horns preceded its hoofs in the order that they were created, as it is stated: “And it shall please the Lord better than a bullock that has horns and hoofs” (Psalms 69:32). This verse is referring to the one particular bull whose horns preceded its hoofs. And Rav Yehuda says that Shmuel says: The bull that Adam the first man sacrificed had one horn in its forehead, as it is stated: “And it shall please the Lord better than a bullock that has horns [makrin] and hooves.” The Gemara raises a difficulty: Isn’t makrin plural, which indicates two horns? Rav Naḥman bar Yitzḥak says: Mikkeren is written, i.e., the letter yod is missing from the word, indicating that there was only one horn.
The lifebreath of a person is the lamp of the God. Revealing all one's inmost parts.
Rabbi Yehudah Leib Alter of Ger, the Gerer Rebbe (1847-1905)
It is written: “A lamp [candle] of the Lord is the soul of man, searching out all the belly’s chambers.” [Prov. 20:27] The Talmud notes that searching requires a candle. One candle from another. “I will seek out Jerusalem with candles.” [Zeph. 1:12]
Sanctuary and Temple are found in every one of Israel, as Torah says: “I will dwell within them.” [Ex. 25:6] These are present insofar as a person makes it clear to himself that all of life-energy comes from the soul. Thus we say each day: “The soul that You have placed within me is pure...” This means that there is a certain pure place within each person, but it is indeed deeply hidden.
When the Temple was standing, it was clear that all life-energy came from God. This is the meaning of the verse “the indwelling of Shekhinah [in the Temple] was witness that God dwells in Israel.” But even now, after that dwelling place has been hidden, it can be found by searching with candles. The candles are the mitzvot; we need to seek within our hearts and souls in order to fulfill a mitzvah with all our strength...
Especially at this season, when lights were miraculously lit for Israel even though they did not have enough oil, there remains light even now to help us, with the aid of these Chanukah candles, to find that hidden light within. Hiding takes place mainly in the dark; we need the candles’ light to seek and to find...By the power of inwardness we can find the hidden light within all our own hidden chambers.
Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the Lubavitcher Rebbe (1902-1994)
My father-in-law reported this conversation with his own father Rebbe Sholom Dov-Ber, then the Lubavitcher Rebbe:
“The hasid asked: Rebbe, what is a hasid?
The Rebbe answered: A hasid is a streetlamp lighter.
In olden days, there was a person in every town who would light the gas streetlamps with a light he carried at the end of a long pole. On the street corners, the lamps were there in readiness, waiting to be lit. A streetlamp lighter has a pole with fire. He knows that the fire is not his own, and he goes around lighting all the lamps on his route.”
Today, the lamps are there, but they need to be lit. It is written, “The soul of man is a lamp of God,” and it is also written, “A mitzvah is a lamp and the Torah is light.” A hasid is one who puts personal affairs aside and goes around lighting up the souls of Jews with the light of Torah and mitzvot. Jewish souls are in readiness to be lit. Sometimes they are around the corner. Sometimes they are in a wilderness or at sea. But there must be someone who disregards personal comforts and conveniences and goes out to ignite these lamps with his or her flame. That is the function of a true hasid.
Looking into the Flame - Rabbi Dovber Pinson
Looking at the flames, what do we see? Noticeably there are three basic elements to the fire; the flame, the wick and the oil or wax. Says the Zohar; the body is similar to the wick, the flame itself is analogous to the divine presence that rests above the head, and the oil that fuses the two together, allowing the flame to join and remain connected with the wick is our ma’asim tovim-good and illuminating deeds. (3:187a)...In truth we are like a flame. The totality of who we are is reflected within the flame. The spiritual elements of self, the fire reaches upward, the physical body which gravitates downward is the wick, and our good deeds allows for a full integration among all aspects of self, body and soul.
The flame is who we are. Appropriately, the Hebrew word nefesh (spirit), comprised of the three letters, nun, pei, shin, is an acronym for ner (flame), pesilah (wick) and shemen (oil).
Penetrating a bit deeper we begin to notice the fire itself and become aware of the different shades of color within the flame. Essentially, there is the dark, intense blue light on the one hand, and on the other extreme a white luminous, almost transparent light.
What do these colors represent? The Zohar describes the following;
“In the flame itself there are two lights: one white and luminous, the other black or blue. The white light is the higher of the two and rises steadily. The black or blue light is underneath the other, which rests on it as on a pedestal. The two are inseparably connected, the white resting and being enthroned upon the black…This blue or black base is in turn attached to something beneath it which keeps it in flame and impels it to cling to the white light above. This blue or black light sometimes turns red, but the white light above never changes its color. The lower light, which is sometimes black, sometimes blue, and sometimes red, is a connecting link between the white light to which it is attached above and to the concrete body to which it is attached below, and which keeps it alight. This light always consumes anything which is under it or which is brought in contact with it, for such is its nature, to be a source of destruction and death. But the white light which is above it never consumes or destroys and never changes.
(1 Zohar. p. 51a.)
So there are two differences, one is that the darker light continually fluctuates and changes colors, whereas the white light is a constant. Another variant is that the darker fire, unlike the white light, needs to consume and destroy another to exist.
This lower more dense fire is a reflection of all of physical life, in which life feeds off death and everything in nature is continuously altering and putting on different coats. In the physical plane of existence, in order for one living organism to survive it must consume another form of life. After the body has served its purpose, it slowly rejoins the earth and transforms into the soil upon which new life grows. Mineral becomes plant, plant becomes animal, animal man, and man in turn returns to earth.
White Fire - Higher, white fire is our spirituality, that which does not need to overwhelm or negate the other to exist. The whiter and more transparent the shade of fire becomes the deeper the level of soul it represents until the peak of the flame, a point in which the transparent fire becomes almost invisible and dips into the infinite space and merges.
Within the human psyche there are levels of varying consciousness. The outermost manifest surface self is our autobiography, that which is in a constant state of motion and movement, so long as we are sensing this part of self is expanding, much like the lower fire that fluctuates, jumps around, changes colors depending on the heat. Higher and deeper within us rests the core of self, the essence of soul. The self that is the unchanging that registers the changing, the continuous that observes the discontinuous, the uninfluenced that informs the influenced.
The ecstatic dancing flames as well as the more subdued gentle flames mirror life itself. Every moment we live, and with every breath we take, we are constantly moving, shifting back and forth, inhaling and exhaling, expanding and contracting. Meta-physically speaking, every moment of life we are continually being recreated, becoming embodied and expiring and then re-embodying again.
The movement upwards and beyond is ratzu–a deep desire to expire and lift off, whereas the movement downward and within is shuv–a deep awareness that the purpose is within the here-and-now. The constant flickering of the lower flames jumping and leaping higher is the ratzu. Shuv is the more settled and clearer whiter light. The spiritually less evolved levels of self desire expiration, to transcend world, and in the process neglect body, yet the deepest awareness is one that is in total harmony with its divine purpose, which is to be within the world, as you are intentionally embodied, and there catapult a transformation. Obviously, the shuv reality is a profounder level and state of bitul-negation of separate self, as one is more in tune with the divine reality and the ultimate purpose.
Hannah Arendt, from Men in Dark Times, 1968.
"Dark times," in the broader sense I propose here, are as such not identical with the
monstrosities of this century which indeed are of a horrible novelty. Dark times, in contrast, are not only not new, they are no rarity in history, although they were perhaps unknown in American history, which otherwise has its fair share, past and present, of crime and disaster. That even in the darkest of times we have the right to expect some illumination, and that such illumination may well come less from theories and concepts than from the uncertain, flickering, and often weak light that some men and women, in their lives and their works, will kindle under almost all circumstances and shed over the time span that was given them on earth— this conviction is the inarticulate background against which these profiles were drawn. Eyes so used to darkness as ours will hardly be able to tell whether their light was the light of a candle or that of a blazing sun. But such objective evaluation seems to me a matter of secondary importance which can be safely left to posterity.