Editorial: Hanukkah brings light during these troubled times
The holiday offers an important message at a time when anti-Semitism is on many people’s minds.
The Issue:The eight-day Jewish Festival of Lights begins tonight at sundown.
Our Opinion:The holiday offers an important message at a time when anti-Semitism is on many people’s minds.
Tonight at sundown, Jews here and around the world will begin this year's eight-day celebration of Hanukkah, the Festival of Lights. It's a joyful time filled with gift-giving, delicious treats, song and family and community fellowship.
We have no doubt that people will find joy in this occasion this year as they always do, but it's likely that troubling recent events will lurk in the back of many minds even as they celebrate. We're witnessing a resurgence of anti-Semitism in America and around the world, a trend captured most regrettably in the October massacre of 11 people at prayer in Pittsburgh's Tree of Life synagogue.
Hanukkah is an appropriate time to reflect on these matters. Though it's a festive occasion, the holiday also reminds us of a dark time in ancient Jewish history. It celebrates the rededication of the Temple in Jerusalem by the Maccabees after a three-year rebellion resulted in their victory over the Syrians in 170 BC. Jews were rebelling against Syrian rule because Jews had been prohibited from practicing their religion and were being forced to worship Greek gods. The Syrians defiled the sacred Temple, calling for an altar to Zeus to be constructed there and for pigs to be slaughtered on the site in violation of Jewish law.
During Hanukkah, Jews express joy at their ancestors' victory but understand that the conflict itself was the result of the kind of persecution the Jewish people have endured for thousands of years.
In the decades since World War II ended Jews in America and in much of the Western world have enjoyed growing acceptance in communities where they are a fairly small minority. But vigilance on the part of Jews and their friends in the larger community is essential If we are to keep things that way.
The Anti-Defamation League reports that anti-Semitic incidents in the United States increased nearly 60 percent in 2017 and that millions of hateful messages against Jews are being spread on social media. Even in New York, the cultural home of American Jewry, police had reported 142 crimes motivated by bias against Jews from January through October. More have occurred since then, including a recent shocking act of vandalism on the office of a Jewish professor at Columbia University.
The situation is worse on the global level. Many Jews in Europe live in fear as attitudes in the general population turn against them. A recent poll commissioned by CNN found troubling attitudes toward Jews are widespread on the continent, and that knowledge of the Holocaust is in decline in the very places where Nazi atrocities happened.
But Hanukkah reminds us that the answer is to act rather than to despair. In this case what's needed is a sustained effort among all people of goodwill to push for understanding and to reinforce the notion that everyone deserves to worship as they please in peace.
Here in Berks County we are blessed with excellent interfaith relations thanks to great leadership and communication among Christian, Jewish and Muslim leaders. It was inspiring to see such an overwhelming local show of solidarity after the Pittsburgh synagogue shootings.
Our wish for this Hanukkah is that the attitudes that prevail here take hold elsewhere in America and around the globe. May the candles Jews light during this holiday help to bring lasting light and enlightenment to the world.