Rosh Chodesh Kislev 5785

(1) God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the cattle that were with him in the ark, and God caused a wind to blow across the earth, and the waters subsided.(2) The fountains of the deep and the floodgates of the sky were stopped up, and the rain from the sky was held back;(3) the waters then receded steadily from the earth. At the end of one hundred and fifty days the waters diminished,(4) so that in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat.(5) The waters went on diminishing until the tenth month; in the tenth month, on the first of the month, the tops of the mountains became visible.(6) At the end of forty days, Noah opened the window of the ark that he had made(7) and sent out the raven; it went to and fro until the waters had dried up from the earth.(8) Then he sent out the dove to see whether the waters had decreased from the surface of the ground.(9) But the dove could not find a resting place for its foot, and returned to him to the ark, for there was water over all the earth. So putting out his hand, he took it into the ark with him.(10) He waited another seven days, and again sent out the dove from the ark.(11) The dove came back to him toward evening, and there in its bill was a plucked-off olive leaf! Then Noah knew that the waters had decreased on the earth.(12) He waited still another seven days and sent the dove forth; and it did not return to him any more.(13) In the six hundred and first year, in the first month, on the first of the month, the waters began to dry from the earth; and when Noah removed the covering of the ark, he saw that the surface of the ground was drying.(14) And in the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth was dry.

While Israel stayed in that land, Reuben went and lay with Bilhah, his father’s concubine; and Israel found out. Now the sons of Jacob were twelve in number.

(3) Reuben, you are my first-born,
My might and first fruit of my vigor,
Exceeding in rank
And exceeding in honor.
(4) Unstable as water, you shall excel no longer;
For when you mounted your father’s bed,
You brought disgrace—my couch he mounted!

May Reuben live and not die,
Though few be his numbers.

ואל ימת AND LET HIM NOT DIE, in the world to come (Sifrei Devarim 347:1) : that the incident of Bilhah be not remembered unto him (Sifrei Devarim 347:3).

יחי ראובן ואל ימות, “may Reuven live and not die;” Moses refers to the period when the members of that tribe would be in the vanguard of crossing the Jordan and battling the Canaanites.

(7) Then a proclamation was issued in Judah and Jerusalem that all who had returned from the exile should assemble in Jerusalem,(8) and that anyone who did not come in three days would, by decision of the officers and elders, have his property confiscated and himself excluded from the congregation of the returning exiles.(9) All the men of Judah and Benjamin assembled in Jerusalem in three days; it was the ninth month, the twentieth of the month. All the people sat in the square of the House of God, trembling on account of the event and because of the rains.(10) Then Ezra the priest got up and said to them, “You have trespassed by bringing home foreign women, thus aggravating the guilt of Israel.(11) So now, make confession to the LORD, God of your fathers, and do His will, and separate yourselves from the peoples of the land and from the foreign women.”(12) The entire congregation responded in a loud voice, “We must surely do just as you say.(13) However, many people are involved, and it is the rainy season; it is not possible to remain out in the open, nor is this the work of a day or two, because we have transgressed extensively in this matter.(14) Let our officers remain on behalf of the entire congregation, and all our townspeople who have brought home foreign women shall appear before them at scheduled times, together with the elders and judges of each town, in order to avert the burning anger of our God from us on this account.”(15) Only Jonathan son of Asahel and Jahzeiah son of Tikvah remained for this purpose, assisted by Meshullam and Shabbethai, the Levites.(16) The returning exiles did so. Ezra the priest and the men who were the chiefs of the ancestral clans—all listed by name—sequestered themselves on the first day of the tenth month to study the matter.(17) By the first day of the first month they were done with all the men who had brought home foreign women.

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.

(1) In [the era of] the Second Temple, the Greek kingdom issued decrees against the Jewish people, [attempting to] nullify their faith and refusing to allow them to observe the Torah and its commandments. They extended their hands against their property and their daughters; they entered the Sanctuary, wrought havoc within, and made the sacraments impure.
The Jews suffered great difficulties from them, for they oppressed them greatly until the God of our ancestors had mercy upon them, delivered them from their hand, and saved them. The sons of the Hasmoneans, the High Priests, overcame [them], slew them, and saved the Jews from their hand.
They appointed a king from the priests, and sovereignty returned to Israel for more than 200 years, until the destruction of the Second Temple.

(2) When the Jews overcame their enemies and destroyed them, they entered the Sanctuary; this was on the twenty-fifth of Kislev. They could not find any pure oil in the Sanctuary, with the exception of a single cruse. It contained enough oil to burn for merely one day. They lit the arrangement of candles from it for eight days until they could crush olives and produce pure oil.

(3) Accordingly, the Sages of that generation ordained that these eight days, which begin from the twenty-fifth of Kislev, should be commemorated. Candles should be lit in the evening at the entrance to the houses on each and every one of these eight nights to publicize and reveal the miracle. These days are called Chanukah. It is forbidden to eulogize and fast on them, as on the days of Purim. Lighting the candles on these days is a Rabbinic mitzvah, like the reading of the Megillah.

On Chanukah—In the days of the Hasmonean, Mattathias son of Johanan, the High Priest, and his sons, when the iniquitous power of Greece rose up against thy people Israel to make them forgetful of thy Law, and to force them to transgress the statutes of thy will, then didst thou in thine abundant mercy rise up for them in the time of their trouble; thou didst plead their cause, thou didst judge their suit, thou didst avenge their wrong; thou deliveredst the strong into the hands of the weak, the many into the hands of the few, the impure into the hands of the pure, the wicked into the hands of the righteous, and the arrogant into the hands of them that occupied themselves with thy Law: for thyself thou didst make a great and holy name in thy world, and for thy people Israel thou didst work a great deliverance and redemption as at this day. And thereupon thy children came into the oracle of thy house, cleansed thy temple, purified thy sanctuary, kindled lights in thy holy courts, and appointed these eight days of Chanukah in order to give thanks and praises unto thy great name. For all these things thy name, O our King, shall be continually blessed and exalted for ever and ever.