Merry Christmas, and Happy First Night of Hanukkah! On Christmas Eve, millions of the world’s Christian faithful lit candles signifying the entrance of the baby Jesus, the Light of the World, into our world. This Christmas night, Jews worldwide will celebrate the first night of Hanukkah, the eight-day festival of light, which celebrates the triumph of light over darkness and spirituality over materiality. The lighting of the Hanukkah menorah predated the lighting of the Advent and congregant candles, but they both hold parallel significance. Light has come, and the darkness will never be the same.
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The last time Christmas and Hanukkah dovetailed was in 2005. As Rabbi Joseph Potasnik of the New York Board of Rabbis noted:
While Hanukkah and Christmas are celebrated by different religions, the two share similar messaging around the need for more good and peace around the world. “It’s a mitzvah to bring light into the world. If you look at Christmas, it’s all about bringing light and love,” says Potasnik. “We both believe that we have a special obligation to illuminate this world with love and kindness.”
Yes and no. While Christians are encouraged to shine the light of Jesus, we recognize that illumination is not in our power. We must embrace what John called, “The true Light, who gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.” Because if it were up to me, I would remain a burned-out bulb. This past year has been a struggle to hold on to the light, let alone illuminate it.
It’s been a different Christmas. Last year, there was reason to be out of sorts and a bit off-kilter. We had moved across the country and were only six months into our new home state. There was no expectation that I would have it all together for the holidays, let alone do anything more than go to a Christmas service and then go home. But I had greater expectations for 2024. I expected that we would be a bit more settled. I expected that we would have made more significant connections. I expected that it would be a fuller and more fun-filled time. For a number of reasons, this was not to be. In fact, this Christmas, I scrambled to find light more than I have in times past. I seemed to be more unsettled, which cast shadows on most everything. I was able to take comfort in the fact that I’m not alone in that feeling. Between the state of the nation and the state of the world, we all have our varying degrees of unsettling, some more than others.
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While the Hanukkah story about the miracle of the oil resonates and fits, this year, it is the Christmas story that I am hearing with fresh ears. I feel as though Mary and Joseph’s journey is especially for those who are out of step with the holly, the jolly, and the merriment. Our pain, our grief, our discombobulation over the state of our lives or the state of the world is uniquely felt. What did Solomon write? “The heart knows its own bitterness, and no stranger shares in its joy.”
So it was with Mary and Joseph. They were experiencing something that no human had ever experienced. They were called and mantled to be the vehicles by which the Light of the world would gain entrance. How disconcerting is that? Talk about joy wrapped around grief; while they understood the blessing they had been given, they also understood that their lives would never be the same. But they embraced, they listened, and they welcomed the light into their lives. Mary’s cousin Elizabeth and her husband Zechariah also had their world upended and were walking a similar path. Because Zechariah failed to embrace what the angel Gabriel had told him about Elizabeth bearing a son in their dotage, he was rendered mute until the child’s birth. Once Zechariah let his relatives and friends know that his son would be named John, his tongue was loosed, and he uttered a beautifully prophetic song that talked about the entrance of the light and how it would alter our lives.
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[B]ecause of the tender mercy of our God, by which the Dawn will visit us from on high, to shine on those who live in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace.”
Darkness and shadow of death could well define this period in our nation as well as this period of my life; so the promised visitation from the Dayspring from on high to guide me into paths of peace is a welcome hope, and all I have to do is embrace it.
So that has been the lesson this Christmas season: embrace, no matter where I am. Tune my ears to hear, and welcome the light. Whether Christmas or Hanukkah, because Light has come into the world, we have a brighter future ahead.
Here are my good wishes for a very Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, and Paths of Peace for your New Year!
