Pirsumay Nisa

It’s Hanukkah. Or Chanukah, if you prefer.

And no, it isn’t “Jewish Christmas,” although as the holiday has gained more visibility in recent years (I attribute this to Adam Sandler and “The Hanukkah Song”), it’s taken on characteristics of Christmas. Like this idea that Hanukkah is a time for peace and love. It’s all over the cards: “Peace and Love and Light.” Live, laugh, love for Jewish people, I guess.

Thing is, Hanukkah commemorates an uprising where Jews refused to be assimilated into Syrian-Greek culture in the second century BCE. The priest Matisyahu and, later, his son Judah (The Maccabee) led a guerilla uprising against the Greeks and recaptured the Holy Temple in Jerusalem, cleared it of idols, and rededicated it on the 25th day of Kislev. Problem was, they only had enough oil for the temple menorah to last one day. But—wonder of wonders, miracle of miracles, that small amount of oil last eight days, until more oil was brought.

So, these days, we light a menorah (technically a chanukiah, which is specific to the holiday) for eight days, using either oil or candles. I use candles. Oil-burning menorahs scare the shit out of me for some reason I can’t adequately articulate. I’m convinced they’ll burn my house to the ground with me in it. No, I don’t know why. Yes, I know people around the world use oil-burning menorahs and don’t die.

And the Talmud commands us to publicize the miracle. Pirsumay nisa, in Aramaic. That means when we kindle the lights of our chanukiah, we must place it where it can be seen. Because we should take pride in being Jewish after resisting assimilation, basically. Also to remind ourselves and one another of the miracle. But primarily to let as many people as possible know that they are passing a Jewish home.

Now, more than ever I think, that’s vital.

2022 has seen a rise in antisemitism not seen since World War Two, and that is unsettling. We’ve all seen that photograph of the menorah in the window of a home across from the headquarters on the Nazi Party, taken in 1931, before the party’s rise to power in Germany. It’s a powerful image.

And somewhat prophetic. Jews are still around and the Nazi Party isn’t. Yes, I know we have neo-Nazis and other far-right lunatics, as the 1538 incidences of antisemitism reported by the Anti-Defamation League this year attest to. But we’re still here and we’re still publicizing the miracle of the oil that occurred after that other time someone thought they’d wipe us out. And I don’t mean to get preachy, but it’s the truth.

Now we light the menorah and hold our collective breath and hope it doesn’t bring unwanted attention. I live in a pretty liberal suburb of Atlanta and there are a lot of Jewish families in my neighborhood. The Kroger near my job has an 8-foot menorah in the parking lot. I feel safe lighting my candles every night. But I was listening to NPR the other day and a woman said she probably wouldn’t put her menorah where it could be seen from the street because the Proud Boys had marched through her neighborhood. The fucking Proud Boys.

Yes, this is Georgia and Georgia is a red state, I don’t care how much the news calls it a purple state. Atlanta and its suburbs are a big blue hole in a desert of red. The way Lesotho is completely surrounded by South Africa. But the Proud Boys have never marched through my neighborhood, so I heard that and it chilled me. In 2022, seventy-seven years after the concentration camps were liberated and the Nazi Party was defeated, we have Jewish people in America who are afraid to display their menorahs and fulfill the mitzvah of pirsumay nisa. It’s bullshit.

And I don’t know what to do about it, other than to light my menorah every night this Hanukkah and put it where anyone walking or driving by can see it and know that we’re here. Despite 4000 years of people trying to destroy us, we’re still here.

(The hippo menorah is my husband’s. He loves hippos.)