Articles Chanukah

Ask any child – or adult for that matter – how we celebrate Chanukah and chances are beyond pretty good that the answer will be by lighting the…

For better or worse, in the minds of many—Jew and non-Jew alike—Chanukah and Christmas are two sides of a similar, if not the same, coin. Chanukah is…

There is no more powerful symbol than light in our tradition. It is how we usher in the Shabbat, march down the wedding aisle, mark the yahrzeit of a…

Mai Chanukah? What is Chanukah? the Talmud (Shabbat 21ba) queries, a question we find with respect to no other holiday. The Talmud explains that…

Before there were clocks and standard time, time was determined in relation to the position of the sun—hence, the importance of the sundial. As…

One of the painful realties of Jewish life is that the Jewish people are often judged by a double standard. What in other cultures is done with…

The holiday of Chanukah is a most beloved one. Lighting the candles is the only mitzvah that has, built into its performance, a three-tiered system:…

Perhaps the greatest challenge facing Jewishly conscious people in the modern world is figuring out the proper relationship we are to have vis a vis…

Of all our holidays, only that of Chanukah begins in the second half of the month. Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and Shavuot occur towards the beginning…

"Mai Chanukah? What is Chanukah?" (Shabbat 21b). To this rather strange question, the Gemara answers, "Our Rabbis taught: From the twenty-fifth of…

On the surface, it is difficult to understand why we celebrate Chanukah, a festival commemorating the rededication of the Temple and Jewish…

Chanukah is a most popular holiday, even amongst “secular” Jews. For those living in Israel, the vastly outnumbered Maccabees defeating…

We tend to assume that, with the recital of the shir shel yom, the daily psalm—or Aleinu if you daven nusach sefarad, Shacharit is over.…