Hebrew Reading Practice: Find and read the additional paragraph for Chanukah in the Amidah. The Chanukah paragraph is located after the "Modim" prayer in the Shabbat Shacharit Amidah.
מאי חנוכה דתנו רבנן בכ"ה בכסליו יומי דחנוכה תמניא אינון דלא למספד בהון ודלא להתענות בהון שכשנכנסו יוונים להיכל טמאו כל השמנים שבהיכל וכשגברה מלכות בית חשמונאי ונצחום בדקו ולא מצאו אלא פך אחד של שמן שהיה מונח בחותמו של כהן גדול ולא היה בו אלא להדליק יום אחד נעשה בו נס והדליקו ממנו שמונה ימים לשנה אחרת קבעום ועשאום ימים טובים בהלל והודאה
"What is Hanukkah?" Our Sages taught: On the 25th of Kislev - the days of Hanukkah, they are eight, not to eulogize on them and not to fast on them? When the Greeks entered the Temple, they polluted all the oils in the Temple, and when the Hasmonean dynasty overcame and defeated them, they checked and they found but one cruse of oil that was set in place with the seal of the High Priest, but there was in it only [enough] to light a single day. A miracle was done with it, and they lit from it for eight days. The following year [the Sages] fixed those [days], making them holidays for praise and thanksgiving.
ת"ר לפי שראה אדם הראשון יום שמתמעט והולך אמר אוי לי שמא בשביל שסרחתי עולם חשוך בעדי וחוזר לתוהו ובוהו וזו היא מיתה שנקנסה עלי מן השמים עמד וישב ח' ימים בתענית [ובתפלה] כיון שראה תקופת טבת וראה יום שמאריך והולך אמר מנהגו של עולם הוא הלך ועשה שמונה ימים טובים לשנה האחרת עשאן לאלו ולאלו ימים טובים הוא קבעם לשם שמים והם קבעום לשם עבודת כוכבים
Our sages taught: When Adam saw that the days were getting shorter (during the fall months beginning in the Hebrew month of Tishrei), he said: "Oy, I did the wrong thing and therefore the World is getting darker and is returning to chaos. That must be the death that was decreed upon me!" Adam spent 8 days in fasting and prayer. When Tevet came (and the winter began), Adam saw that the days were getting longer. He understood that the progressive decrease or increase in daylight was how the World works, and in the following year, he made the dates of his fast 8 days of celebration. Adam set this holiday to worship God, while the nations worship their gods.
Not as tightly knit in paradigm, theme, and practice as the other holidays, Hanukkah lends itself to being a type of holy day Rorschach test. Every community and generation has interpreted Hanukkah in its own image, speaking to its own needs.
When the Rabbis asked, "What is Hanukkah?" their answer focused on the purification of the Temple and the miracle of the oil that burned for eight days. As a new spiritual leadership dealing with the religious challenge of Jewry's survival after the loss of sovereignty and power, the Rabbis stressed the divine miracle to the exclusion of military and diplomatic acts and the sovereignty exercised by the Maccabees. Similarly, medieval Jews focused on the divine miraculous activity in Hanukkah, projecting their own sense of helplessness and their longing for the messianic redeemer to do it al for them.
By contrast, modern Zionists saw in Hanukkah a reflection of their agenda; they celebrated the Maccabee military prowess and political achievement. An early secular Zionist song proclaimed that "a miracle did not happen to us, we found no cruse of oil." To these Zionists, the Maccabee state building was eternal message of the holiday.
For modern liberal Jews, Hanukkah became the holiday of religious freedom. The Maccabee fight was presented as the uprising of a religious community against suppression; the Festival of Lights was a victory for, and a living model of, the religious tolerance that Jews taught the modern world. To uphold this view, liberals had to filter out the fact that while Hasmoneans fought for the right to practice their own religion, they were hardly pluralist. In fact, the Maccabees, fought Hellenising Jews to the death and suppressed them as soon as they achieved power. Similarly, American Jews have turned Hanukkah into the great gift holiday...
Hanukkah is a paradigm of the relationship between acculturation and assimilation. The final victory of Hanukkah was set in motion by the resistance of the most traditional elements--many of them the “square” country folk--to the growing encroachment of Hellenistic values. In many ways, the rebels were in greater conflict with their fellow Hellenising Jews than with the Hellenes. The arrogant universalism in Hellenism demanded that Jews give up their distinctive religious ways for the greater good. Many Jews agreed but the Pietists did not….
At the same time, it is not enough to be stubborn or to ignore the surrounding culture. This tactic works only when Jews are isolated. It was not working in the big cities of Judea in the second century BCE, and it will not likely work well in the highly magnetic culture/society of today.
The Chasidim of those days could not have won the battle alone. In the conflict, many Hellenising Jews decided to stand by their fellow Jews rather than by the Greeks. A coalition won the victory of Hanukkah--the traditionalists united with acculturating Jews who decided to come down on the Jewish side. Even as they fought the cultural battle, the Maccabees and, later, the Pharisees did not simply reject Hellenism. They were profoundly touched by its individualism, its methods of analysis, literary rhetoric, and its theological concepts. They absorbed a great deal, but they gave a distinctly Jewish cast to the outside ideas and rejected many others….
Hanukkah points to the fragility of historical redemption and the ambiguity of its messengers and leaders. Salvation does not come from one group or through pure angelic leaders. Redemption comes out of a mixture of self-interest, ideas, class and social conflicts; out of governmental errors and human miscalculation….Hanukkah shows that spirit can persist.
Traditionally, Hanukkah celebrates not a victory but a miracle. Although God may be present in all events we sense God's presence in only those events in which there is an element of awe, an element pointing to the hand of God. For the Jewish people, the significance of the victory of the few and the weak is that it raises our consciousness of God. Because it is the hoped-for but unexpected help of God that we have celebrated, another miracle was added to the major one, the potency of one cask of oil to burn for eight nights instead of only one. Lest Hanukkah be over militarised , we should be cautious about describing what it is that we celebrate: the agency of God not only in our lives but in our history. For the Jews, history trails in the tracks of God. --Commentary by Prof. Ed. L. Greenstein
Candles are lit at sundown on an 8 armed menorah. If you are not at home at sundown light them as soon as you return to your home. Candles should be placed in a window so that they can been seen from the outside so that you "publicise" the miracle of Hanukkah reminding passersby of the holiday and redemption.
The candles are placed in the menorah from right to left (just as Hebrew is read from right to left), but are lit from left to right. The shammash (helper or servant) candle is always the first one lit, and is used to light the others, starting with the left-most one. (Think of it as lighting the candle representing the newest night first.)
On Friday night, light the Hanukkah candles before lighting the Shabbat candles. On Saturday night light the Hanukkah menorah after Havdalah.
The prayers for lighting the Chanukah candles can be found on p. 732-734 in the green Singer's Siddur.