On Monday night, the sixth night of Chanukah, December 30, community members gathered at the Young Israel of Hillcrest to hear a shiur titled “Chanukah: Finding Clarity,” delivered by Rabbi Jonathan Rietti in memory of Sarah Belka bas Reuven Serle, as well as “Brachah bas Yevel,” “Yosef Chaim ben Bity,” and for a r’fuah sh’leimah for “Nekadam bas Bonu,” and for a shidduch for Yonatan ben Osnas. The shiur was hosted by Chazaq.
Rabbi Etan Schnall, Rav of the Young Israel of Hillcrest, greeted everyone and shared some thoughts about Chanukah and the current situation in Eretz Yisrael. Rabbi Schnall noted that people ask: How can we celebrate when our brothers and sisters are in such distress in Israel? Compared to a year ago, Rabbi Schnall pointed out that many things have changed for the better. We no longer have a strong Hezbollah or Hamas, and we have seen successes. Things are not back to normal, and we must keep praying, but he said that if we didn’t celebrate a Yom Tov in totality, then our Yiddishkeit would be missing. He related that we have seen miracles and yad Hashem in our time and in this war. Chanukah teaches us that our success is from Hashem. This is the one aspect of the holiday that we need to be engaged in.
Next, Rabbi Rietti, well-known international speaker, posed the following question: What is the greatest clarity we can come to in our lives? He answered that we can’t control much in our lives. This is a world that is dark. It’s a world of sheker that lacks clarity. The Hebrew letters shin, kuf, and reish are out of order, because sheker is out of context and not a full picture of reality. The letters in emes are in order from the beginning, the middle, and the end of the Hebrew alphabet, and emes gives a full picture of reality in context.
Today, with the immediacy of world news, that news becomes a commercial, so to speak, of what appears to be reality. Rabbeinu Yonah (d. 1263) taught that every judge in court is not a real judge. Only Hashem is the real judge. There is no injustice in Hashem’s world. We don’t understand the perfection of Hashem’s world.
Chanukah in its bright clarity reminds us that Hashem controls everything and He made promises to us. He promised that we will be His people forever. He made a bris olam, a covenant forever with us. “I’ll be to you and your children your power forever. I power everything!”
Rabbi Rietti noted how all the ancient empires came and went, while the Jewish people are still here. The candles remind us that anyone who stood up against us is gone. He pointed out the word history is “His” story, Hashem’s story. History is Hashem’s story from Creation until today. Hashem gave us promises of what will happen and He knows the future and controls it. He will bring His final redemption as He wants it, no matter what mistakes we make. It’s impossible to sabotage G-d’s plans. The only real clarity is that Hashem is real.
He taught that we are in this world to rehearse for the Next World. Rebbe Nachman of Breslov taught that the days of Chanukah are days of gratitude. Gratitude means admitting that I owe you. The word chayim is plural. There is no word for life in the singular. Olam HaBa and Olam HaZeh are always interfacing. We are judged every night as our neshamah leaves us; and every day when we wake up, we thank Hashem for returning it to us. The extent to which we say we are reliant on Hashem and we realize we can’t exist or succeed without Him the more we will succeed. “Hashem created me to pay attention to Hashem.”
Chanukah reminds us that we don’t live in this world. The culture of the Greeks saturated the Jewish community. It celebrated art and beauty. It glorified this world. Hashem says we should enjoy this beautiful world. The first command in the Torah is: Eat from all the trees in the garden. Enjoy and savor the taste of this world. We need to remind ourselves that this is the taste of clarity that G-d gives us when we leave this world. The main joy is in the Next World. The amount of praise and thanks we express in this world will be in proportion to how much we will have in the Next World. We are all capable of exclusive focus.
We need to thank Hashem for everything and not become stuck in anger, hate, resentment, or reve
By Susie Garber
nge which are part of this world of sheker. “Don’t get stuck in nonreality thinking. There are no other powers!”
